i 


LIBRARY 

OF  THK 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 

Class 


0, 


THE  LIFE  OF  HENRY  A.   WISE 

OF  VIRGINIA 


THE 

LIFE   OF  HENRY  A.  WISE 

OF   VIRGINIA 
1806-1876 


BY  HIS  GRANDSON 
THE  LATE   BARTON   H.   WISE 


THE   MACMILLAN   COMPANY 

LONDON r.MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  LTD. 

1899 

All  rights  reserved 


COPYRIGHT,  1899, 
BT  THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY. 


NorfaooB  $tesa 

3.  S.  Gushing  &  Co.  -  Berwick  &  Smith 
Norwood  Masa.  U.S.A.. 


CONTENTS 


PA.OB 


BARTON  HAXALL  WISE ix 

CHAPTER  I 

The  Eastern  Shore  Peninsula.  The  Wise  Family.  Birth  of 
Henry  A.  Wise  and  School  Days  at  Margaret  Academy  and 
Washington  College.  Attends  Law  School  of  Judge  Tucker 
in  Winchester  1 


CHAPTER  II 

Marriage  to  Miss  Jennings  and  Removal  to  Nashville.  Visit 
to  the  "  Hermitage "  and  Impressions  of  "  Old  Hickory." 
Practice  of  the  Law  and  Return  to  Virginia  ...  25 

CHAPTER  m 

Political  Views  and  Election  to  Congress.  Personal  Appear 
ance.  Duel  with  Richard  Coke  34 


CHAPTER   IV 

The  Twenty-third  Congress.     The  Debates  over  the  Abolition 

Petitions.    John  Quincy  Adams 42 

CHAPTER  V 

Advocates  Building  of  an  Ironclad.  Opposes  Van  Buren's 
Election.  A  Reporter's  Description  of  Wise.  The  Ex 
punging  Resolutions.  Death  of  his  Wife.  Views  on  Tem 
perance.  Sargent  S.  Prentiss 63 

CHAPTER  VI 
The  Graves-Cilley  Duel 80 


222435 


Yl  CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  VII 

PAGB 

The  Nomination  of  Harrison  and  Tyler.  "The  Union  of  the 
Whigs  for  the  Sake  of  the  Union."  Campaign  of  1840. 
Mr.  Tyler's  Administration.  Annexation  of  Texas.  Wise 
made  Minister  to  Brazil.  Parting  Advice  to  his  Constitu 
ents.  Second  Marriage 87 

CHAPTER  VIII 

Trip  to  Brazil  on  Board  the  "  Constitution."  Life  at  Rio.  The 
African  Slave-trade.  Visit  of  General  Sherman.  Events 
leading  to  Wise's  Return 108 

CHAPTER  IX 

Wise's  Home  on  Onancock  Creek.     Resumes  the  Practice  of 

Law.     Anecdotes  of  his  Career 120 

CHAPTER  X 

The  Movement  leading  to  the  Virginia  Constitutional  Conven 
tion  of  1850-51.  The  Mixed  and  White  Basis.  Wise's 
Part  in  the  Convention.  The  Struggle  for  Equality  of 
Representation  in  Virginia 129 

CHAPTER  XI 

Third  Marriage.  Opinion  of  Old  Bachelors.  Address  before 
the  Virginia  Colonization  Society.  "Africa  gave  to  Vir 
ginia  a  Savage  and  a  Slave,  Virginia  gives  back  to  Africa  a 
Citizen  and  a  Christian  !  "  Views  in  Regard  to  the  Negro 
and  Slavery.  Delegate  to  the  National  Democratic  Con 
vention  of  1852 155 

CHAPTER  XII 

The  Virginia  Campaign  of  1855.  The  Overthrow  of  Know- 
nothingism  in  the  South.  "  I  have  met  the  Black  Knight 
with  his  Visor  down  and  his  Shield  and  Lance  are  broken  "  165 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  XIII 

PAGE 

Urged  to  become  a  Presidential  Candidate.  Inauguration  as 
Governor.  Advocates  Buchanan  for  President.  Confer 
ence  at  Raleigh.  The  Ceredo  Colony  in  Virginia.  Views 
as  to  Thanksgiving  Day.  Improvement  and  Material  De 
velopment  of  Virginia,  and  Causes  that  had  retarded  it 
stated.  Views  on  Subject  of  an  Oyster  Tax  and  State 
Insurance.  State  Arms,  Finances,  etc.  ....  206 

CHAPTER  XIV 

The  John  Brown  Invasion.  His  Trial  and  Execution.  Wise's 
Description  of  him  and  Message  to  the  Legislature.  The 
Report  of  the  Legislative  Committee.  Unveiling  of  the 
Washington  Monument  at  Richmond  .....  240 

CHAPTER  XV 

Purchases  "  Rolleston  "  near  Norfolk.  Declines  to  be  a  Candi 
date  before  the  Charleston  Convention.  Supports  Brecken- 
ridge  and  Lane.  Opposes  Secession  and  favors  "  Fighting 
in  the  Union."  The  Virginia  Convention  of  1861  and 
Wise's  Part  in  it  .........  262 

CHAPTER  XVI 
War.     The  Campaign  in  Western  Virginia          ....    282 

CHAPTER  XVII 
Roanoke  Island      ..........     305 

CHAPTER  XVm 

Writes  to  General  Lee  advocating  the  Construction  of  a  Marine 
Battery  by  the  Confederacy.  Assignment  to  command  a 
Brigade.  Takes  Part  in  Battle  of  Malvern  Hill.  Stationed 
at  Chaffin's  Bluff.  Anecdotes  of  Generals  Lee  and  Wise. 
Williamsburg  Expedition.  Ordered  to  South  Carolina.  A 
War-time  Aurora  Borealis  316 


Vlll  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  XIX 

PAQB 

Ordered  back  to  Virginia.  Fight  at  Nottoway  Bridge.  The 
Battle  of  Drewry's  Bluff.  The  First  Day's  Attacks  on 
Petersburg 336 

CHAPTER  XX 

The  Battle  of  the  Crater.  Grant's  Attacks  on  Lee's  Right  in 
March,  1865.  The  Retreat  to  Appomattox.  Sailor's  Creek. 
Surrender  of  Lee's  Army.  Wise  paroled  ....  357 

CHAPTER  XXI 

Scenes  at  the  Surrender.  Generals  Meade  and  Custer.  Wise 
visits  his  Son  and  Friends  in  South-side,  Virginia.  His 
Horse,  Pair  of  Mules,  and  an  Ambulance  seized.  Finds  his 
Home  in  Possession  of  the  Freedman's  Bureau.  Oil  Paint 
ings  and  Furniture  stolen.  Anecdote  of  General  Butler. 
Correspondence  with  General  Lee  in  regard  to  Proclamation 
of  Amnesty.  Indicted  for  Treason.  Locates  in  Richmond 
and  resumes  Practice  of  Law.  Correspondence  with  his 
Daughter  and  the  Hon.  Fernando  Wood.  Views  of  the 
Political  Conditions  in  Virginia.  Advice  to  the  Young 
Men  of  the  State 367 

CHAPTER  XXII 

Habit  of  Swearing.  Love  of  Paradox.  Temperament  and  Char 
acteristics.  Estimate  of  him  as  a  Public  Man,  and  his  Posi 
tion  with  regard  to  the  Slavery  Question.  Views  on  the 
Civil  War.  His  Oratory.  Fondness  for  Whittling  and 
Good  Living.  Religious  Views.  Love  of  the  Country. 
Sickness  and  Death.  Tributes  of  Judge  Crump  and  Others  402 


BARTON   HAXALL   WISE 

1865-1899 

BARTON  HAXALL  WISE,  the  author  of  this  volume, 
departed  this  life  February  6,  1899,  at  the  early  age  of 
thirty-three.  He  was  the  youngest  and  last  surviving 
child  of  the  marriage  of  the  Rev.  Henry  A.  Wise  and 
Harriet  Haxall,  and  grandson  of  Henry  A.  Wise,  whose 
life  he  has  written.  He  came  into  the  world  in  troublous 
times.  He  was  born  at  the  crisis  of  the  great  civil  strife, 
which  threatened  the  existence  of  the  Union  ;  and  the 
brief  span  of  his  earthly  journey  was  punctuated  with 
more  than  the  ordinary  number  of  landmarks  of  domestic 
bereavement.  His  father,  a  brilliant  young  Episcopa 
lian  divine,  was  classmate  at  college  with  Phillips  Brooks 
of  Boston,  Bishop  Potter  of  New  York,  Bishop  Randolph 
of  Virginia,  and  many  other  distinguished  graduates  of 
the  Virginia  Theological  Seminary.  They  counted  him 
as  their  peer  in  learning,  eloquence,  manliness,  and  Chris 
tian  zeal.  At  the  outbreak  of  the  Civil  War  he  was  in 
charge  of  a  church  in  Philadelphia.  Although  a  non- 
combatant,  his  sympathies  were  with  his  family  and 
friends,  and  he  returned  to  his  native  State.  During 
the  war  he  filled  sundry  parishes  in  Virginia,  and  several 
children  were  born  to  him.  Soon  after  the  restoration 
of  peace,  he  was  called  to  Christ  Church  in  Baltimore, 
but  fell  a  victim  to  disease,  and  died  in  1868,  just  when 
his  eloquence  and  piety  were  gaining  rapid  recognition. 

ix 


X  BARTON   HAXALL   WISE 

He  left  a  widow  and  two  little  boys,  the  younger  of  whom 
is  the  subject  of  this  sketch. 

The  youth  of  the  child  was  passed  in  Richmond,  Vir 
ginia,  amid  scenes  of  change  and  mourning,  which  could 
not  fail  to  make  a  deep  impression  upon  him.  His  grand 
father  Wise,  at  whose  house  he  was  a  frequent  visitor,  was 
no  longer  the  fiery  and  impetuous  Harry  of  by-gone  days, 
but  the  boy  knew  him  as  an  old  and  broken  man,  who, 
after  a  stormy  and  dramatic  career,  in  which  he  had  gained 
prominence  and  honor,  had  been  overtaken  by  disasters, 
political  and  domestic,  which  had  nearly  conquered  his 
indomitable  spirit.  Yet  one  strong  trait  was  as  promi 
nent  in  his  grandfather's  old  age  as  it  had  been  through 
out  his  life,  and  it  is  somewhat  surprising  that  the  book 
dwells  so  lightly  upon  it,  for  no  man  ever  more  thoroughly 
enjoyed  the  companionship  of  children,  or  possessed  for 
them  a  greater  fascination.  My  earliest  recollection  of 
Barton  Wise  was  when,  as  a  little  boy,  he  came,  with  a 
brother  a  year  or  two  older  than  himself,  in  charge  of 
their  mother,  or  a  black  mammy,  to  visit  their  grand 
father  Wise.  They  were  handsome,  sturdy  children,  and 
their  coming  was  a  sure,  if  temporary,  antidote  to  the 
gloomy  broodings  into  which,  at  times,  in  those  days,  the 
grandfather  was  wont  to  relapse. 

The  home  of  Governor  Wise  was  not  more  attractive 
or  happier  than  that  of  their  grandfather  Haxall,  with 
whom  they  lived,  but,  on  such  occasions,  it  was  a  merrier 
and  noisier  spot.  The  hearty  greetings  which  awaited 
them,  the  games  and  toys  and  romps  provided  for  their 
diversion,  made  lifelong  impressions  upon  the  boy.  Many 
a  day  their  sports  were  ended  by  the  tired  little  one 
clambering  into  his  grandfather's  lap  and  falling  asleep 
encircled  by  his  loving  arms.  Although  the  child  had 
known  both  parents,  and  all  his  grandparents,  he  buried 


BARTON   HAXALL   WISE  XI 

them  and  his  only  brother,  one  by  one,  before  he  was  a 
man.  To  him  there  was  beyond  question  a  note  of  pathos 
in  those  sad  lines  of  Praed  reproduced  near  the  end  of  the 
book,  which  his  grandfather  loved  to  repeat  in  his  last  days. 

He  received  an  excellent  education.  When  he  was  a 
small  boy  he  was  placed  in  the  Pampatike  School,  at  the 
home  of  Colonel  Thos.  H.  Carter,  one  of  the  few  establish 
ments  which  retained  the  character  of  the  olden  times,  and 
he  fell  under  the  influence  of  a  lovely  woman,  Mrs.  Carter, 
who  has  stamped  upon  every  boy  attending  the  school, 
the  impress  of  her  singular  refinement  and  high  character. 
He  afterward  attended  the  University  of  Virginia,  where 
he  graduated  in  law,  and  then  devoted  several  years  to 
travel  in  Europe  and  in  all  parts  of  the  United  States, 
lovingly  ministering  to  the  wants  of  an  invalid  mother. 
After  her  death  he  made  a  brief  essay  in  business  in  New 
York,  but  soon  abandoned  it  for  a  residence  in  the  beloved 
State  of  his  birth,  and  devoted  himself  to  the  practice 
of  the  profession  of  law,  for  which  he  was  best  fitted. 
Although  he  was  still  a  very  young  man  he  secured 
reasonable  employment,  and  grew  steadily  and  strongly 
in  the  esteem  of  his  fellow-citizens.  His  practice  and 
private  means  enabled  him  to  consummate  a  happy  mar 
riage  about  five  years  before  his  death,  and  for  the  first 
time  life  seemed  opening  up  to  him  cheerfully,  with  suc 
cess  and  happiness  in  sight. 

He  was  not  a  demonstrative  or  showy  man,  but  one  of 
deep  affection,  of  clear  perceptions,  marked  individuality, 
firm  convictions,  integrity,  and  high  principles.  Upon  a 
recent  occasion,  and  concerning  a  public  issue,  he  proved 
his  independence  by  refusing  to  cooperate  with  his  party, 
denouncing  its  doctrines  and  arraying  himself  against 
its  candidates,  although  well  aware  of  the  temporary  un 
popularity  of  such  a  course.  He  was  a  close  analytical 


Xll  BARTON    HAXALL   WISE 

student,  and  was  scrupulously  cautious  about  committing 
himself  to  any  statement  of  fact  until  he  had  fully  ex 
amined  into  it  and  was  prepared  to  establish  its  truth. 
As  a  speaker  and  as  a  writer  he  was  lucid,  if  not  eloquent ; 
and  as  a  lawyer  he  was  painstaking,  studious,  growing,  and 
watchful  to  a  marked  degree  of  the  interests  committed  to 
his  charge.  These  qualities  are  sure  to  impress  themselves 
upon  the  community  in  which  their  possessor  lives,  and 
that  they  did  so  in  his  case  was  evidenced  by  the  general 
and  deep  expressions  of  sorrow  which  greeted  his  unex 
pected  death.  Those  who  knew  him  best  were  foremost 
in  attesting  his  moral  and  intellectual  growth,  since  he 
renewed  his  residence  in  Richmond,  and  his  death  was 
mourned  as  the  loss  of  a  high-minded,  valuable  citizen. 

Mr.  Wise  had  a  decided  taste  for  literary  and  antiqua 
rian  pursuits.  These  he  indulged  by  active  participation 
in  the  affairs  of  the  Virginia  Historical  Society,  and  by 
several  memoirs  which  he  wrote,  particularly  one  on  the 
life  and  services  of  his  ancestor,  General  John  Cropper. 
During  his  last  years  he  became  more  and  more  absorbed 
in  preparing  this  life  of  his  grandfather.  He  felt,  and 
felt  keenly,  that  the  career  of  that  remarkable  man  had 
not  been  preserved  in  any  fitting  and  connected  record. 
After  infinite  toil  and  research,  he  has  produced  a  thorough, 
faithful,  and  loving  narrative,  which  will  survive.  The 
book  reveals  the  intense  interest  of  the  writer,  and  a  par 
donable  pride  and  loyalty  to  its  subject.  But  it  is  singu 
larly  free  from  fulsome  praise,  and  displays  discrimination, 
breadth  of  view,  and  general  reading,  beyond  the  average 
author  of  to-day.  His  friends  knew  the  keen  anxiety 
with  which  he  looked  forward  to  the  appearance  of  his 
work,  and  the  honest  pride  he  felt  and  joyous  expectation 
which  he  indulged  at  the  prospect  of  seeing  the  results  of 
his  labors  in  print.  Then  came  the  end  —  suddenly  — 


BARTON   HAXALL   WISE  Xlll 

without  much  warning — contrary  to  his  own  expectations 
and  those  of  his  family  and  friends.  The  first  proofs  of 
his  loved  book  were  lying  upon  his  desk  at  the  moment 
when  his  earthly  work  was  ended. 

His  death  was  without  dramatic  incident,  but  it  was 
sad,  as  is  the  death  of  the  young.  Sad,  too,  because 
he  was  loving  and  beloved,  with  much  to  live  for  ;  and 
touching  because,  while  he  was  prepared,  he  did  not  want 
to  go.  The  past  had  been  cheerless  to  him ;  the  present 
was  bright  and  warm  and  hopeful ;  and  the  future  was 
opening  up  to  him  fair  with  every  promise  of  what  the 
past  had  lacked.  The  mournful  task  of  placing  the  cap 
stone  upon  his  work  is  one  bathed  in  tears. 

The  perusal  of  the  book  has  revealed  him  as  an  abler 
and  stronger  man  than  even  his  best  friends  had  known 
him  to  be.  It  draws  nearer  to  him,  than  ever  before,  by 
the  intense  loyalty  and  admiration  he  displays  for  our 
common  ancestor,  one  who  loved  that  ancestor  before  the 
author  of  this  book  was  born,  and  who  still  venerates  his 
memory  above  that  of  all  others. 

The  book  itself  fittingly  embalms  the  grandfather's 
memory,  and  his  fame  will  be  henceforth  linked  with  and 
preserve  the  name  of  his  worthy  descendant  and  biographer. 

Moving  out  to  life's  firing  line  past  the  graves  of  the 
generation  which  preceded  and  followed,  one  almost  feels 
that  he  is  at  last  heir  to  the  solitude  which  is  the  refrain 
of  Praed's  lament. 

Yet  there  are  those  who  still  look  upon  them  both  as 
not  dead.  Those  who  love  to  fancy  that,  as  of  old,  the 
boy,  tired  of  life's  toil,  has  only  clambered  up  once  more 
upon  the  old  man's  lap  and  lies  there  sweetly  sleeping, 
enfolded  in  loving  arms. 

JNO.  S.  WISE. 

NEW  YORK,  March,  1899. 


THE  LIFE  OF  HENRY  A,  WISE 


CHAPTER  I 

THE  EASTERN  SHORE  PENINSULA.  THE  WISE  FAMILY.  BIRTH 
OF  HENRY  A.  WISE  AND  SCHOOL  DAYS  AT  MARGARET  ACAD 
EMY  AND  WASHINGTON  COLLEGE.  ATTENDS  LAW  SCHOOL  OF 
JUDGE  TUCKER  IN  WINCHESTER 

THE  peninsula  formed  by  the  Chesapeake  Bay,  Atlan 
tic  Ocean,  and  Delaware  Bay  includes  the  greater  part  of 
the  State  of  Delaware,  about  one-third  of  Maryland,  and 
two  counties  of  Virginia.  That  portion  at  present  em 
braced  within  the  limits  of  the  Old  Dominion  is  about 
seventy  miles  in  length,  extending  from  the  Pocomoke 
River  to  Cape  Charles,  and  having  a  mean  breadth  of 
from  eight  to  ten  miles. 

It  is  a  flat  and  sandy  tract,  largely  covered  with 
pines,  and  swept  by  the  breezes  of  the  Atlantic  and  Chesa 
peake,  whose  waters  lave  it  on  either  side.  The  Indians 
gave  it  the  name  of  "  Acchawmacke,"  or  Accomack,  which 
in  our  tongue  signifies  "  land  beyond  the  water,"  the 
meaning  having  reference  to  the  location  of  the  peninsula, 
separated  as  it  is  from  the  mainland  of  Virginia  by  the 
Chesapeake  Bay. 

Captain  John  Smith  in  his  voyage  up  the  Chesapeake 
from  Jamestown,  in  1608,  visited  Kiptopeke,  "  the  laugh 
ing  King  of  Accomack,"  and  has  left  us  some  account  of 
the  eastern  shore  and  the  Indians  who  inhabited  it;  but 
B  1 


2  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.    WISE 

no  settlement  was  planted  there  until  grim  Sir  Thomas 
Dale  founded  a  colony  in  1612,  for  the  purpose  of  catch 
ing  fish  and  making  salt,  at  a  point  a  few  miles  above  the 
cape,  on  the  bay  side,  called  "Dale's  Gift."  This  settle 
ment,  although  it  languished  for  a  while,  on  account  of  its 
remoteness  from  Jamestown,  afterward  became  permanent 
and  thrifty,  and  when,  in  the  year  1634,  Virginia  came  to 
be  divided  into  shires,  after  the  English  manner,  Accomack 
formed  one  of  them. 

Owing  to  its  isolated  situation,  the  eastern  shore  of 
Virginia  has  undergone  less  change  than  any  other  part 
of  Virginia,  and  its  people  preserve  to-day  many  of  the 
characteristics  of  the  seventeenth-century  Englishmen,  in 
habits  and  modes  of  speech.  During  Bacon's  rebellion 
they  harbored  Sir  William  Berkeley,  with  whom  they 
sympathized,  and  when  a  century  later  the  storms  of  the 
Revolution  broke,  they  sent  their  quota  of  men  to  join 
the  standards  of  Washington;  but  at  home  naught  ever 
happened  to  disturb  the  quiet  of  the  little  sea-girt  land, 
and  the  life  of  its  simple  folk  flowed  in  an  even  channel, 
broken  by  scarce  a  ripple. 

The  peaceful  Indians,  among  whom  the  first  inhabitants 
settled,  had  almost  entirely  disappeared  by  the  end  of  the 
seventeenth  century,  and  the  dying  out  of  the  savage  was 
followed  by  the  coming  of  the  negro. 

Simple  frame  dwellings,  inhabited  by  a  body  of  primi 
tive  country  people,  in  a  land  affording  every  delicacy  of 
food  and  drink,  characterized  the  peninsula  at  an  early 
day  as  at  present. 

With  their  vessels  coming  from  the  West  Indies,  bring 
ing  goodly  supplies  of  Jamaica  rum,  admirable  for  toddies, 
and  with  excellent  peach  brandy  at  home,  and  salt-water 
creeks  about  them  abounding  in  the  finest  terrapin,  crabs, 
and  oysters  in  the  world,  the  eastern  shore  men  recked 


THE  WISE   FAMILY  3 

little  of  the  outside  world,  and  were  a  contented,  happy 
people. 

Despite  its  mild  climate  and  other  conditions  which 
conduced  to  laissez-faire,  the  eastern  shore  men  were  a 
more  thrifty,  shrewd  people  than  were  to  be  found  else 
where  in  tide-water  Virginia,  and  the  slaves  were  never 
so  numerous  as  to  deprive  the  peninsula  of  a  class  of 
hardy  yeoman. 

Like  the  contiguous  portion  of  Maryland,  however,  but 
little  of  the  spirit  of  modern  progress  has  been  felt,  and  it 
was  not  until  the  year  1884,  nearly  three  centuries  after 
the  first  settlement,  that  the  sound  of  a  locomotive  was 
heard  in  Accomack,  —  communication  with  the  outside 
world  having  been  entirely  by  water. 

John  Wise,  the  progenitor  of  the  Wise  family  in  Vir 
ginia,  sailed,  according  to  Hotten,  from  Gravesend  in  the 
ship  Transport,  bound  for  Virginia,  July  4,  1635,  and 
settled  on  the  eastern  shore.  He  was  then  but  eighteen 
years  of  age,  and  as  far  as  can  be  ascertained  was  a  mem 
ber  of  the  Devonshire  family  of  that  name.  Henry  A. 
Wise  used  to  say  that  he  was  descended  from  Sir  William 
Wise,  knighted  by  Henry  VIII.  for  his  wit,  and  who, 
when  asked  by  the  king  what  fleur-de-lis  meant,  replied, 
"It  means  French  lice,  Sire."  This  John  Wise  early 
figured  in  the  records  of  Accomack  and  Northampton, 
which  began  as  early  as  1632.  He  married  Hannah 
Scarburgh,  daughter  of  Captain  Edmund  Scarburgh  (or 
Scarborough),  who  had  emigrated  from  Norfolk,  England, 
and  whose  son  of  the  same  name  afterwards  became  the 
Speaker  of  the  House  of  Burgesses  and  Surveyor-General 
of  the  colony.  With  Calvert  he  ran  the  boundary  line 
between  Maryland  and  Virginia.  Colonel  Edmund  Scar 
burgh  was  among  the  most  picturesque  of  the  colonial 
figures,  and  a  haughty,  domineering  cavalier.  He  erected 


4  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY  A.  WISE 

the  first  salt  works  in  the  colony,  of  which  commodity  he 
long  enjoyed  a  monopoly,  and  on  account  of  his  influence 
over  the  Indians  was  given  the  name  of  "conjurer."  In 
1662  he  conducted  an  expedition  against  certain  rebellious 
Quakers,  residing  near  the  Maryland  boundary,  whom  he 
required  to  subscribe  to  the  oath  of  loyalty  to  the  king's 
government,  but  upon  any  refusing  he  "set  ye  broad 
arrowe  "  above  their  door-posts. 

John  Wise  purchased  a  tract  of  land  on  the  Chescon- 
nessex  and  Onancock  creeks,  the  deed  to  which  made 
by  "Ekeekes,"  the  Indian  king  of  Onancock  and  Ches- 
connessex,  may  still  be  seen,  and  the  real  considera 
tion  of  which,  according  to  tradition,  was  seven  Dutch 
blankets. 

Sir  William  Berkeley,  the  governor,  afterward  in 
1668,  made  a  grant  of  1060  acres  to  Wise,  part  of  which 
was  confirmatory  of  that  previously  purchased  of  the 
Indian  king. 

This  John  Wise  was  one  of  the  justices  of  the  Court 
and  a  man  of  consideration  in  his  day  and,  it  is  said,  noted 
for  his  piety.  He  died  in  1695.  He  had  an  eldest  son 
John  Wise,  but  as  if  fearing  this  worthy  might  not  sur 
vive,  he  named  a  second  one  John,  "  called  Johannes  for 
distinction  sake."  This  first-named  John,  however,  did 
perpetuate  the  name ;  and  from  the  landing  of  the  emi 
grant  in  1635,  down  to  the  subject  of  this  biography,  there 
were  in  all  six  generations  of  the  family,  the  eldest  son  in 
every  instance  being  named  John  Wise,  and  they  con 
tinued  to  reside,  as  planters,  on  the  family  estate  lying  on 
the  Chesconnessex  Creek.  John  Wise,  the  fourth  of  the 
name,  was  a  man  of  prominence  on  the  peninsula  and 
justice  of  the  peace.  He  married  Margaret  Douglas,  the 
daughter  of  George  Douglas,  a  native  of  Scotland,  who 
was  the  leading  lawyer  of  his  day  in  Accomack ;  and  their 


MAJOR  JOHN  WISE  5 

son,  John  Wise,  who  was  known  as  Major  John  Wise,  from 
a  commission  held  in  the  militia  sevice,  was  the  father  of 
Henry  A.  Wise. 

Major  John  Wise  owned  large  tracts  of  land  and  a 
number  of  slaves  and  was  a  lawyer  by  profession,  which 
he  combined  with  planting.  He  was  a  man  of  high  char 
acter  and  intelligence,  greatly  beloved  by  the  people  of 
his  native  county,  and  seems  to  have  been  one  of  those 
men  to  whom  the  inhabitants  of  a  community  naturally 
turn  for  guidance  and  advice.  A  likeness  of  him  is  extant, 
a  delicately  executed  miniature,  on  ivory,  which  represents 
a  handsome  man,  with  large  intelligent  brown  eyes,  gentle 
expression  of  countenance,  and  clear-cut  features.  He  is 
dressed  after  the  fashion  of  the  period,  with  high-collared 
blue  coat,  stock  and  muslin  shirt,  and  powdered  hair, 
queued  behind.  He  married,  first,  Mary  (called  Polly) 
Henry,  a  daughter  of  Judge  James  Henry,  a  native  of 
Accomack  and  a  graduate  of  the  University  of  Edinburgh, 
who  settled  in  Northumberland  County,  was  a  member  of 
the  Continental  Congress,  and  a  judge  of  the  Admiralty 
Court,  formerly  in  existence,  and  hence  of  the  first  Court 
of  Appeals.  Judge  Henry  was  a  man  of  learning,  whose 
opinions  were  respected.  By  his  marriage  with  the 
daughter  of  Judge  Henry,  Major  Wise  had  two  sons,  John 
James  and  George  Douglas,  who  attained  to  manhood 
and  inherited  the  family  estates,  Fort  George  and  Clifton, 
on  the  Chesconnessex.  The  last  named  of  these  sons  died 
without  issue,  but  the  former  married  and  left  the  estates 
to  his  two  sons,  John  James  Henry  and  George  Douglas 
Wise,  in  whose  possession  they  remained  until  the  year 
1867,  when  they  were  sold  to  settle  up  the  estate  of  the 
latter,  who  was  the  assistant  inspector  general  in  Wise's 
Brigade,  Bushrod  Johnson's  Division,  Anderson's  Corps, 
Army  of  Northern  Virginia,  and  who  died  from  the  effect 


6  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

of  wounds  received  in  June,  1864,  in  the  trenches  in  front 
of  Petersburg. 

Major  John  Wise  was  a  Washingtonian  Federalist  in 
politics  and  represented  the  county  of  Accomack  in  the 
House  of  Delegates  for  about  ten  years,  beginning  in 
1790. 

At  the  sessions  of  1794-5-6  and  7  he  was  elected  Speaker 
of  that  body,  and  the  year  following,  at  the  noted  session 
which  passed  the  celebrated  resolutions  of  1798,  which 
were  so  strongly  anti-Federalist,  he  was  chosen  Speaker 
over  Wilson  Gary  Nicholas,  a  Republican  and  favorite  of 
Jefferson.  This  circumstance  aroused  the  indignation  of 
Mr.  Jefferson,  who  roundly  abused  those  of  his  followers 
who  had  forgotten  their  party  allegiance  at  such  a  time 
and  voted  for  a  Federalist. 

The  year  following,  Major  Wise,  on  account  of  his 
opposition  to  these  resolutions,  was  defeated  for  reelec 
tion  by  Larkin  Smith,  of  King  and  Queen  County,  John 
Stewart,  the  federal  clerk  being  succeeded  at  the  same 
time  by  William  Wirt,  and  shortly  after  Wise  retired  from 
public  life.  He  was  at  this  period  a  widower,  and  having 
abandoned  the  turmoil  of  politics,  his  thoughts  naturally 
enough  reverted  to  the  choice  of  a  second  helpmate  and 
were  directed  toward  Miss  Sallie  Cropper,  the  daughter 
of  General  John  Cropper,  who  resided  with  her  father,  at 
the  ancestral  seat,  Bowman's  Folly,  on  Folly  Creek,  a  few 
miles  from  Accomack  Court  House ;  and  the  following 
correspondence,  which  has  been  preserved,  will  show  with 
what  result  his  addresses  were  received :  — 

JOHN  WISE  to  GENERAL  CROPPER  (without  date). 

"  Feeling  myself  irresistibly  impelled  by  inclination,  and 
prompted  by  a  sense  of  propriety,  I  have  presumed  now  to 
address  you  upon  a  subject  of  importance  and  delicacy. 


MAJOR  JOHN   WISE  7 

"  Having  conceived  an  affection  for  your  daughter  (Miss 
Sally)  I  beg  leave  to  solicit  your  permission  to  make  my 
addresses  to  her,  and  at  the  same  time,  let  me  express  a 
hope  that  should  I  be  so  fortunate  as  to  succeed  in  obtain 
ing  her  affections,  my  first  wishes  may  not  be  frustrated 
by  your  disapprobation,  I  have  thought  proper  to  make 
the  application  to  you  on  the  subject  in  this  manner, 
rather  than  in  person,  because  my  character,  (if  I  have 
acquired  any,)  my  condition  and  my  situation  in  life  are 
not  altogether  unknown  to  you,  and  if  objections  are  to  be 
made  they  can  be  more  freely  communicated  in  this  than 
in  any  other  way.  I  have  hitherto  proceeded  no  further 
with  the  lady  than  merely  to  obtain  her  permission  to 
make  this  application,  and  Sir,  I  now  pledge  you  the 
honor  of  a  Gentleman,  that  in  case  you  have  objections,  of 
an  insuperable  nature,  to  the  proposed  union,  whatever 
may  be  the  chagrin,  regret  and  mortification  which  I  may 
feel  upon  the  occasion,  I  will  not  disturb  the  quiet  of  a 
parent  anxiously  solicitous,  no  doubt,  for  the  happiness 
of  a  beloved  daughter,  by  persisting  any  further  with 
her. 

"  Permit  me  to  assure  you  that  I  am  with  much  con 
sideration  and  respect,  your  obedient  servant, 

"JOHN   WISE." 

"BOWMAN'S  FOLLY,  11  of  May.  1797. 

"  SIR  :  —  Although  the  application  made  by  letter  of 
this  day  was  unexpected,  yet  my  reflections  heretofore  on 
that  subject  have  prepared  me  to  answer :  That  however 
solicitous  I  may  be  for  the  temporal  felicity  of  my 
daughter  and  future  respectability  of  my  daughter  and 
future  respectability  of  my  child,  she  is  the  only  proper 
Judge  of  the  person  best  calculated  to  make  her  happy. 
Respect  and  impartiality  ought  to  be  shown  by  me  to  you 


8  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY  A.  WISE 

or  any  gentleman  that  might  make  his  address  to  my 
daughter,  and  I  confide  in  your  candor  and  justice. 

"  I  am,  sir,  with  due  respect, 

"  Your  obedient  servant, 

"JOHN  CHOPPER." 

The  reader,  however  he  may  smile,  will  not  be  surprised 
to  learn  that,  in  consequence  of  this  formal  exchange  of 
epistles,  Miss  Sarah  Corbin  Cropper  became,  on  the  18th 
day  of  April,  1799,  the  bride  of  Major  John  Wise.  She  is 
said  to  have  been  a  handsome  blonde,  of  a  high-strung 
nervous  temperament,  and  a  temper  of  her  own,  and 
received  her  education  at  the  celebrated  school  of  Mrs. 
Valeria  Fullerton,  on  Mulbury  Street,  Philadelphia,  where 
she  formed  the  friendship  of  Maria  Jefferson,  her  school 
mate;  and  where,  also,  she  had  a  love-affair  with  Mr. 
Thomas  Sergeant,  a  nephew  of  her  schoolmistress,  and 
brother  of  the  distinguished  lawyer  John  Sergeant.  This 
match  was  broken  off  on  account  of  some  objection  raised 
by  her  father,  and  singularly  enough,  as  if  by  way  of 
illustrating  the  old  saying  that  a  marriage  interfered  with 
between  two  families  in  one  generation  will  occur  in  a 
succeeding  one,  many  years  afterward,  the  son  of  Major 
Wise,  by  his  union  with  Miss  Cropper,  married  a  niece  of 
her  old  sweetheart. 

Owing  to  its  geographical  position,  the  intercourse  of 
the  eastern  shore,  both  commercial  and  social,  was  with  the 
North  almost  entirely,  and  especially  with  Philadelphia, 
and  in  this  already  famed  city  Sallie  Cropper  had  formed 
something  of  a  taste  for  fashionable  society,  so  that  it 
could  not  have  been  remarked  of  her,  as  the  English 
peasant  said  of  Lady  Canning,  that  "  when  fortune  made 
her  a  fine  lady,  she  spoiled  the  bonniest  farmer's  wife  old 


BIRTH   OF   HENRY  A.  WISE  9 

England  ever  saw,"  for  it  is  related  that  she  was  even 
better  fitted  for  the  city  than  a  country  life. 

Major  Wise  had  changed  his  residence,  prior  to  his  sec 
ond  marriage,  from  his  estate  on  the  Chesconnessex,  to 
the  little  village  of  Drummondtown,  the  county  seat, 
where  he  was  for  some  time  Commonwealth's  attorney, 
and  later  on  for  a  number  of  years  clerk  of  the  Court,  and 
an  honored  member  of  that  representative  body  of  old- 
time  Virginians. 

His  wife  bore  him  six  children,  of  whom  three  died 
young.  Henry  Alexander  Wise,  the  fifth  child  of  this 
marriage,  was  born  at  Drummondtown,  Accomack  County, 
Virginia,  December  3,  1806,  and  was  called  by  his  mother' 
after  a  Mr.  Alexander  Fullerton  of  Philadelphia,  the  hus 
band  of  her  old  schoolmistress,  and  the  name  of  Henry 
was  given  in  compliment  to  Judge  James  Henry,  to  whom 
Major  Wise  was  much  attached.  The  house  in  which  he 
was  born,  a  large  old-fashioned  frame  dwelling,  with 
dormer  windows,  located  opposite  the  Court  green,  in 
after  years  became  and  was,  until  a  short  time  past,  the 
village  tavern;  on  the  porch  of  which  the  bucolic  sons  of 
the  peninsula  would  gather  to  talk  over  politics  and  county 
affairs,  or  to  play  "  seven-up  "  and  "  back-gammon,"  from 
which  pastimes  they  would  adjourn  from  time  to  time,  to 
regale  the  inner  man  with  the  cup  which  both  cheers  and 
inebriates. 

Major  John  Wise  died  in  1812,  and  the  year  following 
his  widow  passed  away,  thus  leaving  the  subject  of  this 
biography  an  orphan  at  the  age  of  six  years.  It  is  related  • 
of  the  wife  of  Major  Wise  that  as  she  lay  upon  her  death 
bed  she  turned  to  a  woman  attendant,  seated  by  her,  and 
looking  her  in  the  face,  asked  if  she  thought  that  she 
would  ever  rise  from  her  bed  again,  to  which  query  the 
servant,  with  tears  in  her  eyes,  answered  "No,"  where- 


10  THE  LIFE  OF   HENRY  A.  WISE 

upon  the  invalid  sprang  from  her  bed  calling  out,  "I'll 
show  you,  you  hussy,"  and  as  a  result  of  this  exertion 
died  soon  after. 

After  the  death  of  his  mother,  young  Wise  was  taken 
to  the  home  of  his  maternal  grandfather,  General  Cropper, 
who  had  been  appointed  his  guardian,  and  under  whose 
roof-tree  at  Bowman's  Folly  he  remained  for  the  next 
two  years.  Bowman's  Folly  is  located  on  what  is  there 
known  as  the  sea  side  of  the  peninsula,  the  terms  "  sea  side" 
and  "  bay  side  "  on  the  eastern  shore  of  Virginia  and  Mary 
land  being  understood  to  designate  localities,  the  waters 
of  which  flow  into  the  Atlantic  or  Chesapeake  respectively. 

The  homestead  of  the  Croppers  is  situated  on  Folly 
Creek,  several  miles  distant  from  Drummondtown,  and 
within  full  view  it  empties  into  Metompkin  Bay,  which 
in  turn  outlets  into  the  ocean  through  the  inlet  of  the 
same  name. 

General  Cropper,  when  but  nineteen  years  of  age,  had 
raised  the  first  company  in  Accomack,  at  the  outbreak  of 
the  Revolution,  as  captain  of  which  he  had  marched  north 
ward,  to  join  Washington  at  Morristown.  He  had  been 
married  but  a  few  months  previously  and  left  behind  him, 
at  Bowman's  Folly,  his  young  wife.  Cropper  served  with 
conspicuous  gallantry,  as  a  major,  at  Brandywine  and  at 
Germantown,  and  throughout  the  Northern  Campaign, 
wintered  at  Valley  Forge,  and  at  Monmouth  commanded 
Morgan's  regiment  of  Virginia  riflemen.  In  the  fall  of 
1778  he  returned  home  on  furlough,  where  he  saw,  for  the 
first  time,  his  infant  daughter,  Sarah  Cropper,  who  had 
been  born  after  his  march  northward  and  was  then  about 
a  year  and  a  half  old.  He  did  not  return  north  again,  to 
join  the  army,  but  was  allowed  to  remain  at  home  on  an 
indefinite  leave  of  absence,  where  his  duties  as  county  lieu 
tenant  occupied  him  closely,  in  protecting  the  peninsula 


GENERAL   CROPPER  11 

from  the  Tories  and  the  British  barges  which  were  ravag 
ing  the  coast;  and  his  services  rendered  in  this  capacity 
were  even  more  valuable  than  those  of  an  officer  of  the 
continental  line. 

Gathered  around  him  in  after  years  on  the  winter  nights 
at  Bowman's  Folly,  the  children  would  never  tire  of  hear 
ing  him  relate  the  story  of  the  bloody  fight  at  Brandywine, 
when  the  7th  Virginia,  the  command  of  which  had  de 
volved  upon  him,  was  almost  cut  to  pieces,  and  he  himself 
wounded  by  a  bayonet  thrust ;  and  how  when  the  ensign 
had  been  killed  and  the  colors  captured,  he  drew  a  ramrod 
from  a  musket,  tied  his  red  bandanna  handkerchief  to  the 
end,  and  hoisted  it  as  a  flag ;  and  upon  meeting  General 
Knox  on  Chester  Bridge  the  latter  alighted  from  his  horse, 
and  pressing  him  to  his  bosom,  said,  "  The  boy  we  thought 
lost  is  found."  Their  youthful  imaginations  were  stirred, 
too,  when  they  heard  him  tell  of  the  night  the  British 
rowed  up  Folly  Creek  with  muffled  oars,  and  made  an 
attack  upon  the  house ;  and  of  the  bloody  battle  of  the 
Accomack  volunteers  on  board  their  barges,  with  the 
privateersman  cruising  in  the  bay. 

General  Cropper  was  a  whole-souled  country  squire, 
fond  of  a  horse-race  and  cock-fight,  and  an  ardent  patriot 
and  public-spirited  man.  He  had  much  of  the  Irish  heed- 
lessness  of  money  affairs,  characteristic  of  the  old-time 
Virginia  gentleman,  and  when  he  passed  away  left  his 
property  greatly  encumbered.  He  was  a  stickler  for  eti 
quette  and  jealous  of  his  prerogatives  as  an  officer  of  the 
militia.  It  happened  upon  one  occasion  that  a  young 
officer  addressed  a  note  to  him,  asking  the  loan  of  a  brass 
cannon,  to  be  used  at  a  militia  drill,  which  letter  he  con 
cluded  in  the  following  terms,  "  permit  me  to  sign  myself, 
John  G.  Joynes."  Cropper,  much  incensed,  refused  to 
deliver  the  cannon,  on  the  ground  that  the  "  letter  did  not 


12  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY  A.  WISE 

contain  that  respectful  language  which  ought  to  have  been 
used  by  an  inferior  officer  when  addressing  the  commander 
of  the  regiment."  He  said  that  the  letter  ought  to  have 
concluded  with,  "  respectfully,  I  am,  sir,  your  very  obedi 
ent  servant,"  or  "  sir,  your  very  obedient  servant." 

When  in  January,  1821,  the  veteran  answered  his  last 
roll-call,  William  Wirt  wrote  to  his  daughter :  "  The 
account  you  gave  me  of  the  little  incident  about  three 
weeks  before  his  death,  requesting  you  to  trace  with  him 
the  military  map  of  New  Jersey,  and  the  old  war  songs 
with  which  he  closed  the  ideal  excursion,  is  very  interest 
ing.  The  soldier's  heart  beat  in  his  bosom  to  the  last,  and 
those  scenes  were  the  freshest,  as  well  as  sweetest  to  his 
recollection,  in  which  he  had  in  the  morning  of  life  drawn 
his  sword  in  his  country's  cause,  under  the  banners,  too,  of 
the  immortal  Washington." 

His  veneration  for  the  character  of  Washington  was 
such  that  in  after  years  when  a  member  of  the  legislature 
at  Richmond,  whenever  he  attended  a  banquet,  or  gather 
ing  where  toasts  were  given,  he  would  arise,  as  Mr.  Curtis 
tells  us  in  his  "  Recollections,"  and  give  the  only  senti 
ment  ever  offered  by  him :  "  GOD  BLESS  GENERAL 
WASHINGTON." 

It  is  related  of  him  that  upon  the  publication  of  Mar 
shall's  biography,  he  would  frequently  gather  his  children 
and  grandchildren  about  him  at  night,  and  read  to  them 
the  story  of  his  great  commander,  the  book  almost  taking 
place  of  the  family  Bible,  and  on  the  4th  of  July  he  would 
make  them  listen  to  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  and 
on  the  22d  of  February,  the  Farewell  Address  complete. 

Students  of  the  laws  of  heredity  lay  it  down  as  a  gen 
eral  principle  that  a  daughter  inherits  the  disposition  and 
temperament  of  her  father,  and  a  boy  those  of  his  mother. 
It  would  seem  that  in  the  case  of  Henry  A.  Wise,  this  law 


A  BOYHOOD   LIKENESS  13 

was  illustrated,  as  he  doubtless  received  from  his  grand-  j 
father,  through  his  mother,  his  excitable  disposition,  which' 
made  him  wayward  and  impetuous.  General  Cropper 
used  to  say  that  most  of  his  sons  and  grandsons  would, 
make  gentlemen,  but  that  Tom  Bayly  and  Henry  Wise' 
would  be  hung. 

The  following  description  of  Wise,  written  by  himself,  [ 
gives  us  a  likeness  of  him  in  his  boyhood,  much  of  which 
will  apply  to  the  full-grown  man  :  — 

"  He  was  a  pale  and  puny  boy  in  body,  of  large  eyes 
and  mouth  and  ugly,  and  so  odd  and  oldish  he  wouldn't 
mate  with  the  children,  but  sought  the  old  folks  and 
learned  their  sayings,  and  was  fond  of  sweethearts  older 
than  himself,  and  spent  his  pocket  money  for  red  ribbons  and 
climbed  after  nuts  and  fruit  for  their  favors.  He  delighted 
in  old  stories,  loved  curious  things ;  caught  up  quaint  say 
ings,  made  something  or  much  of  what  others  threw  away 
as  nothing ;  was  called  by  hard  nicknames,  but  especially 
by  the  name  of  Prince  Hal,  because  of  a  high-strung  ner 
vous  temperament ;  and,  fondled  by  black  nurses,  he  was 
wilful  in  his  humors  and  sharp  and  quick  and  imperious 
in  his  temper ;  he  loved  fun  and  was  fond  of  sport,  pre 
cocious  in  mischief,  tough  and  wiry  in  his  tissues,  an 
active,  daring  bad  boy  who  could  learn  whatever  he  tried, 
but  wouldn't  learn  what  he  didn't  love,  and  could  fight 
hard  or  run  fast.  There  was  a  strange  admixture  of 
hardy  recklessness  and  extreme  caution  in  his  nature ;  he 
was  a  great  mimic  and  game  maker,  often  offended  by  his 
broad  humor,  but  was  frank  and  genial,  and  so  warm  in 
his  affections,  and  generous  in  his  disposition,  that  he  was 
generally  popular,  though  he  could  when  he  tried  make 
some  hate  him  with  a  bitter  hate." 

At  the  age  of  eight  years,  Henry  A.  Wise  left  Bowman's 
Folly  to  reside  with  the  two  sisters  of  his  father,  Eliza- 


14  THE  LIFE  OF  HENRY  A.  WISE 

beth  Wise,  an  old  maid,  and  Mrs.  Mary  Outten,  a  widow, 
at  Clifton,  on  the  Chesconnessex  Creek,  about  six  miles 
west  of  Drummondtown,  on  the  bay  side  of  the  penin 
sula.  Mrs.  Outten,  having  lost  a  son  of  her  own,  felt 
for  her  young  nephew  the  anxiety  and  love  of  a  par 
ent.  We  are  told  that  "  she  was  one  of  the  finest  and 
most  dignified  ladies,  of  the  most  sweet  yet  austere  man 
ners  and  morals.  .  .  .  She  curbed  the  wild  and  wayward 
boy  and  first  taught  him  how  to  read.  She  instilled  into 
his  youthful  mind  lessons  of  virtue  and  religion,  and 
taught  him  to  feel  the  manly  sentiment  of  gentlemen,  the 
fear  of  God,  the  fear  of  nothing  else — and  self-respect.  The 
writer  has  often  heard  him  allude  to  this  more  than  parent, 
in  terms  of  the  deepest  filial  gratitude  and  devotion."1 
Wise's  other  aunt,  Elizabeth  Wise,  a  woman  of  unusu 
ally  good  judgment,  also  looked  after  his  welfare  while 
at  Clifton.  Of  this  woman,  Thomas  R.  Joynes,  the  clerk 
of  the  County  Court,  said  that  he  would  rather  have  her 
opinion  upon  a  business  matter  than  that  of  any  man  in 
the  county.  She  and  her  sister  attended  to  the  conduct 
of  the  farm  and  illustrated  the  familiar  saying  that  the 
greatest  slave  upon  a  Southern  plantation  was  the  mis 
tress.  Here  at  Clifton,  young  Wise's  home  continued  in 
the  main  until  his  fourteenth  year. 

The  estate  was  situated  about  two  miles  from  the  mouth 
of  the  Chesconnessex,  where  it  empties  into  the  Chesa 
peake.  About  ten  miles  distant  is  Tangier  Island,  which 
was  occupied  by  the  British  fleet  under  Cockburn,  in 
1814,  and  from  which  the  morning  and  evening  guns  of 
the  enemy  greeted  the  ears  of  the  household.  The  British 
made  numerous  raids  upon  the  main,  and  once  advanced 
up  the  creek  to  within  a  mile  of  Clifton,  but  retired  after 

1  "  Portrait  Gallery  of  Distinguished  American  Statesmen,"  by  William 
H.  Brown. 


ACCOMACK  15 

scattering  a  camp  of  the  militia,  into  which  they  suddenly 
broke,  under  cover  of  darkness. 

Wise's  country  home  afforded  ample  opportunity  for  the 
sports  of  rod  and  gun,  of  which  he  was  over-fond  at  an 
early  age,  and  he  would  fish  for  days  at  a  time,  from  the 
Crammahack  rocks  off  the  Chesconnessex  to  Half  Moon 
Island,  and  thus  became  not  only  a  devoted  but  an  expert 
disciple  of  Isaak  Walton,  and  mingled  freely  with  the  fisher 
men  along  the  bay  shore,  who  taught  him  to  become  as 
skilled  in  the  handling  of  a  sail-boat  as  any  skipper.  It 
was  during  these  early  years,  too,  that  he  formed  that  love 
of  the  ocean  and  its  tributaries,  the  murmur  of  whose 
waters  he  was  as  accustomed  to  hear  as  of  the  soughing  of 
the  pines  of  the  peninsula. 

The  county  of  Accomack  is  too  flat  a  country  generally 
to  correspond  with  our  ideas  of  picturesqueness ;  but  along 
the  creeks,  where  they  wind  in  tortuous  courses  to  mingle 
their  waters  with  the  bay  or  ocean,  tall  evergreen  pines 
and  scarlet  maples  border  the  shore,  and  in  the  distance 
may  be  seen  the  white  caps,  which  add  their  charm  to  the 
scene.  "  The  forests,  though  largely  of  pine,"  are,  as  Wise 
tells  us, "  interspersed  with  oak,  sweet  gum,  ash,  red-maple, 
spruce,  tulip-poplars,  and  hollies,  where  redbreasts  feed. 
Underneath  and  everywhere  are  the  myrtle,  periwinkle, 
honeysuckle,  wild  crab-apple  with  its  perfume,  the  black- 
haw  with  its  egg-form  pearls  of  jet,  the  grape-vine,  and  the 
wild  rose.  The  little  water-craft  sail  to  and  fro  out  of  the 
mouths  of  the  creeks,  into  the  bay  or  ocean,  past  the  sands 
where  the  pipers  skip,  and  the  reeds  where  the  marsh  hen 
cackles  to  her  nest  full  of  eggs,  and  the  heron  and  bittern 
stalk.  The  beaches  and  marshes  have  mollusca  of  all 
sorts,  and  along  the  shore  the  surf  casts  up  myriads  of 
shells,  and  all  sorts  of  seaweeds,  some  scarlet  from  the 
coral  reefs." 


16  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

Along  the  banks  of  the  Chesconnessex,  as  elsewhere 
upon  the  creeks  of  the  peninsula,  there  arose  the  merry 
sound,  when,  — 

"  there  beats 

The  throb  of  oars  from  basking  oyster  fleets, 
And  clangorous  music  of  the  oyster  tongs 
Plunged  down  in  deep  bivalvulous  retreats, 
And  sound  of  seine  drawn  home  with  negro  songs." 

His  youthful  surroundings  made  an  indelible  impression 
upon  the  mind  of  the  child,  and  throughout  life  Wise  re 
tained  his  fondness  for  the  "  milk  of  the  ocean  "  and  land 
of  his  birth. 

At  the  age  of  twelve  years  he  was  sent  from  home  to 
attend  school  at  Margaret  Academy,  about  two  miles  from 
the  hamlet  of  Pungoteague,  in  Accomack.  This  was  the 
first  high-grade  classical  school  permanently  established  on 
the  peninsula.  Shortly  after  the  Revolution,  the  legisla 
ture  incorporated  the  academy,  which  was  organized  by  the 
leading  citizens  of  Accomack  and  Northampton,  and  among 
them  Wise's  father  and  maternal  grandfather ;  but  it  was 
not  until  the  year  1807  that  the  buildings  were  erected 
and  the  academy  opened,  the  legislature  having  given  no 
assistance,  and  the  money  being  raised  by  the  contributions 
of  the  citizens,  to  which  was  added  a  sum  from  the  sale  of 
the  glebe  lands,  and  a  gift  of  five  acres  from  a  prominent 
citizen.  An  old  minute-book  of  the  academy,  kept  during 
the  early  days,  prescribed  the  following  course  of  study  in 
Latin  and  Greek,  in  which,  from  all  accounts,  the  boys 
were  not  over-proficient,  as  they  were  an  unruly  set,  and 
given  to  mischief.  "  The  portion  of  each  classick  to  be 
studied  by  each  student  shall  be  as  follows :  fifty  collo 
quies  in  Cordery,  four  coloq.  in  Erasmus,  the  whole  of  the 
first  part  of  Selecta  e  veteri,  and  from  fifteen  to  twenty 
pages  of  the  second  part,  three  books  of  Selecta  e  profanis, 


SCHOOL  DAYS  17 

six  books  in  Caesar,  the  first  four  and  the  thirteenth  in 
Ovid.  All  Sallust,  the  Eclogues,  the  Georg. ;  and  the 
first  six  books  of  the  En :  in  Virgil ;  all  Horace ;  the 
orations  of  Cicero  from  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  those 
against  Catiline ;  the  four  Evangelists  and  the  Acts  of  the 
Apostles  in  the  testament." 

With  how  much  of  this  formidable  array  of  knowledge 
the  ideas  of  young  Wise  were  taught  to  shoot,  the  writer 
is  not  informed,  but  he  was  not  studious,  and  a  ringleader  / 
in  most  of  the  fun  and  frolic.  The  same  minute-book 
contains  many  curious  and  amusing  regulations,  such  as 
forbidding  the  playing  of  musical  instruments  during  cer 
tain  hours,  providing  for  the  removal  of  students  infected 
with  the  itch,  and  a  warning  against  the  use  of  English 
translations  of  the  classics  and  of  the  drinking  of  spirituous 
liquors,  all  of  which  goes  to  confirm  the  tradition  that  at 
Margaret  Academy  a  boy  learned  more  mischief  than 
Latin  and  Greek. 

In  the  summer  of  the  year  1822,  Wise  not  yet  having ; 
reached  his  sixteenth  birthday,  it  was  determined  to  sendt 
him  to  college,  at  Washington,  Pennsylvania,  as  Wise  tells 
us,  "for  the  improvement  of  his  health  as  well  as  of  his/ 
mind  and  morals."  General  Cropper,  his  grandfather,  had 
died  in  1821,  and  Wise,  being  old  enough  to  make  choice  of 
a  guardian,  selected  his  uncle  by  marriage,  John  Custis, 
Esq.,  who  had  married  his  father's  half-sister,  Tabitha 
Gillett,  and  resided  on  his  farm  on  Deep  Creek,  the  next 
stream  north  of  the  Chesconnessex,  and  here  Wise  made 
his  home  until  the  time  of  his  departure  for  college. ' 

It  was  more  natural  for  a  Virginia  boy  at  that  day  to  go 
to  William  and  Mary,  or  Princeton,  and  Wise  was  induced 
to  attend  Washington  College  by  a  graduate  of  that  insti 
tution,  who  had  been  his  instructor  at  Margaret  Academy,/ 
as  well  as  on  account  of  the  bracing  climate.  He  elected 


18  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.   WISE 

(  for  himself  to  attend,  and  was  possessed  of  a  barely  more 
than  sufficient  income  to  obtain  a  collegiate  education,  as 
his  father  had  left  the  bulk  of  his  estate  to  his  two  eldest 
sons,  and  that  portion  left  Henry  had  been  largely  over 
valued.  His  patrimony  consisted  of  a  farm  on  Onancock 
Creek  and  several  negroes,  also  an  undivided  moiety, 
along  with  his  younger  brother,  in  two  more.  His  farm 
and  slaves  yielded  an  income  of  from  $450  to  $500,  as  the 
land  rented  fairly  well,  and  a  "  likely "  negro  would  hire 
for  a  good  price. 

Washington  College  was  one  of  the  first  founded  west 
of  the  Alleghanies,  and  was  established  a  few  years  after 
the  Revolution  by  the  Scotch-Irish  who  settled  in  that 
country.  It  is  located  in  what  has  been  termed  the  blue- 
grass  region  of  the  North,  and  abounds  in  "  romantic  scen 
ery,  beautifully  rounded  hills,  park-like  groves  and  fertile 
fields,  variegated  with  the  colors  of  ample  harvests,"  and 

,  is  in  the  midst  of  what  is  now  the  oil  region  of  Pennsyl 
vania.  Such  a  landscape  must  have  charmed  the  young 
eastern  shore  man,  who  for  the  first  time  in  his  life  had 
left  his  native  sea-girt  peninsula,  and  gazed  upon  the  pano 
rama  presented  by  a  land  of  mountain  ranges,  undulating 
meadows  and  green  pastures. 

The  president  of  the  college  at  this  time  was  Dr. 
Andrew  Wylie,  a  sturdy  Scotch-Irish  Presbyterian,  of 
large  frame,  brusque  manners,  and  sound  learning,  and 
who  was  pronounced  the  finest  scholar  west  of  the  Alle 
ghanies.  In  after  years,  Wise  wrote  to  Wylie's  biogra 
pher:  "From  October,  1822,  until  the  day  of  his  death, 
I  was  a  pupil  of  whom  he  was  fond,  and  he  lectured  me  to 
the  last  with  partiality  and  loving  kindness,  with  pride  in 
me,  and  with  all  the  pride  of  an  honest,  earnest,  philo 
sophical,  heart-touching  and  head-reaching,  brave,  noble, 
good,  gracious,  and  grave  divine.  I  wish  I  could  tell  you  of 


COLLEGE  LIFE  19 

how  he  taught  me,  —  a  wild,  reckless,  and  neglected  orphan,  / 
a  self-willed  boy, — to  love  honor  and  truth  and  wisdom,  and 
the  standard  of  all  these,  and  try  to  be  virtuous  for  virtue's 
sake  —  never  to  imitate  these  or  anything  else  but  to  be" 
really  what  these  alone  can  elevate  one  to  be."  Wise  was 
far  from  being  singular,  in  his  apparently  exaggerated  esti 
mate  of  Dr.  Wylie,  as  many  of  his  other  pupils  wrote  of 
him  in  a  similar  strain.  Dr.  John  W.  Scott,  the  father-in- 
law  of  ex-President  Harrison,  and  a  pupil  of  the  college  at 
the  time  of  Wise's  matriculation,  tells  us  that  he  was  im 
pressed  with  the  manner  and  presence  of  the  latter,  who  was 
the  bearer  of  a  letter  to  him ;  and  that  he  was  instrumental 
in  persuading  Wise  to  join  the  Union  Literary  Society,  one 
of  the  debating  clubs  of  the  college,  in  which  he  early  ex 
hibited  a  talent  for  extemporaneous  speaking,  and  skill ! 
in  debate.  The  following  year  Wise  was  chosen  to  repre 
sent  his  society  in  a  joint  oratorical  contest,  in  which  the 
judges  awarded  him  the  victory,  his  subject  being  "  The 
Existence  of  a  God,"  and  his  opponent  declared  "  that  it 
was  the  beard  upon  my  face  that  caused  a  child  to  strip 
me  of  my  honors." 

Wise  was  thrice  selected  as  the  orator  of  his  society, 
winning  the  victory  twice,  and  tying  the  judges  the  third 
time. 

But  he  had  by  no  means  outgrown  as  yet  the  period  of 
his  boyish  pranks.  In  1824  Lafayette,  who  was  on  a  visit 
to  this  country,  in  the  course  of  his  triumphal  tour,  visited 
the  little  town  of  Washington.  On  the  day  of  his  ex 
pected  arrival,  the  people  of  the  surrounding  country  had 
flocked  into  the  village  from  miles  around,  and  lined  the 
street,  awaiting  the  arrival  of  the  distinguished  guest, 
whose  coming  was  to  be  announced  by  a  herald  on  horse 
back,  proclaiming  his  approach.  While  excitement  and 
expectation  were  at  a  high  pitch,  Wise  stole  out  of  town, 


20  THE   LIFE  OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

by  way  of  a  back  road,  and  first  disguising  himself,  rode 
'  down  the  main  street  of  the  town,  arrayed  in  a  gorgeous 
I  sash,  shouting  the  approach  of  the  Revolutionary  hero, 
which  was  received  with  great  applause,  but  upon  the  non- 
arrival  of  the  General,  for  some  hours,  the  people  realized 
that  they  had  been  made  the  victims  of  a  hoax,  and  had  not 
the  perpetrator  kept  well  out  of  sight,  he  would  have  fared 
badly  on  the  occasion.  In  time,  however,  the  wayward 
youth  became  more  sensible  of  his  duties  and  studious  in 
his  habits,  which  he  tells  us  was  brought  about  by  his  fall 
ing  in  love  while  yet  a  student  with  one  "  whose  heavenly 
piety  touched  his  heart  and  changed  his  ways." 

The  Rev.  Obadiah  Jennings,  a  man  distinguished  in 
early  life  at  the  bar,  and  later  on  in  the  ministry,  was  the 
pastor  of  the  Presbyterian  Church  at  Washington,  at  that 
time.  It  was  in  this  way  that  Wise  became  acquainted  and 
I  fell  in  love  with  his  daughter  Ann,  and  that  "  his  love  for 
her  made  him  struggle  for  honors,  and  though  her  piety 
was  after  one  of  the  strictest  sects  of  Holy  Faith,  he  made 
successful  ambition  serve  his  love  and  won  her." 

While  Wise  was  a  student  at  Washington  College,  in 
the  fall  of  1824,  General  Jackson  was  on  his  way  to  attend 
Congress,  where  the  House  of  Representatives  was  to  de 
cide  his  success  or  defeat  as  a  presidential  candidate,  and 
travelled  on  horseback  from  Wheeling,  via  the  Cumberland 
road,  passing  the  little  town  of  Washington,  en  route  to 
the  capital  of  the  same  name.  Wise  tells  us  in  his  book, 
the  "  Seven  Decades  of  the  Union,"  "  the  populace  flocked 
to  see  the  hero,  and  among  the  hero-worshippers  who 
crowded  around  him  was  the  eminent  and  excellent 
Andrew  Wylie,  D.D.,  president  of  the  college.  He  knew 
Dr.  Wylie  and  had  the  highest  respect  for  his  character 
and  reverence  for  his  religious  profession  of  the  Presby 
terian  faith.  We  were  not  awed  by  his  presence  but  in- 


GENERAL  JACKSON  21 

tently  studied  him,  and  we  argued  his  greatness  from  his 
looks  and  words,  which  drew  us  close  to  him.  Dr.  Wylie 
made  the  remark  to  him  that  he  had  no  apprehension  about 
the  certainty  of  his  being  chosen  by  the  House  of  Repre 
sentatives,  unless  Congress  was  corrupted,  or  beguiled  by 
factious  intrigues.  Immediately  General  Jackson  replied 
with  flashing  spirit,  '  Sir,  no  people  ever  lost  their  liberties 
unless  they  themselves  first  became  corrupt.  Our  people 
are  not  yet,  if  they  ever  will  be,  corrupt;  and  the  Congress 
does  not  decide  this  obligation  by  the  intrigues  of  corrup 
tion,  for  the  fear  of  their  sovereigns,  the  people.  The 
people  are  the  safeguard  of  their  own  liberties,  and  I  rely 
wholly  on  them  to  guard  themselves.  They  will  correct 
any  outrage  upon  the  political  purity  by  Congress ;  and  if 
they  do  not,  now  or  ever,  then  they  will  become  the  slaves 
of  Congress,  and  its  political  corruption.'  The  remark 
struck  us  then  as  indicating  that  he  was  fit  to  govern  a 
republic,  and  it  has  come  to  us  a  thousand  times  since, 
with  all  the  weight  of  truth  and  prophecy.  He  was  our 
choice  from  that  moment  for  the  presidency. 

"  The  next  morning  a  select  corps  of  students  obtained 
leave  to  join  his  escort  for  miles  on  his  way.  He  rode  a 
splendid  chestnut  sorrel,  the  stock  of  his  old  racer  Pacolet, 
which  he  bought  from  William  R.  Johnson,  in  Virginia, 
and  we  can  see  him  now,  a  model  of  grace  in  the  saddle, 
whilst  he  chatted  at  ease  as  his  horse  kept  the  pace  of  a 
quick  travelling  walk.  He  saluted  us  with  marked  vale 
diction  when  the  students  in  escort  drew  up  to  return,  and 
bade  us  accept  his  acknowledgment  of  our  courtesy  and 
the  advice  from  him  '  to  study  hard  to  fit  ourselves  for 
the  service  of  our  country.'  We  thus  first  knew  Andrew 
Jackson,  the  greatest  man,  take  him  all  in  all,  we  have  ever 
known  among  men." 

After  graduating   at   Washington    College,   where   he 


22  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.   WISE 

i  divided  first  honors  with  another  student,  in  September, 
1825,  Wise  made  a  tour  through  Canada,  before  returning 
home,  but  between  his  being  in  love  and  on  the  other  hand 
his  anxiety  to  place  foot  upon  his  native  peninsula  once 
more,  the  trip  was  neither  as  enjoyable  nor  instructive  as 
it  might  have  been. 

The  winter  of  1825-26  Wise  spent  at  Clifton  in  Acco- 

mack,   and  having  determined  to  study  law,  he  set  out, 

during  the  following  June,  for  Winchester,  Virginia,  to 

:  attend  the  law  school  of  Judge  Henry  St.  George  Tucker. 

Judge  Tucker  had  been  elected  chancellor  of  the  Fourth 
District  of  Virginia,  in  1824,  and  shortly  afterward  estab 
lished  a  law  school  at  Winchester,  which  flourished  with 
great  success,  until  he  abandoned  it  to  become  president 
of  the  Court  of  Appeals.  Although  his  school  was  located 
in  an  out-of-the-way  town,  and  not  connected  with  any 
college,  and  at  a  period  when  travel  was  by  stage,  it  was 
nevertheless  largely  attended,  and  among  the  pupils  were 
many  men  afterward  distinguished  at  the  bar.  George  Hay 
Lee  and  Green  B.  Samuels,  both  of  whom  were  afterward 
members  of  the  Appellate  Court,  and  men  like  R.  M.  T. 
Hunter,  Robert  Y.  Conrad,  John  W.  Brockenbrough, 
and  Charles  J.  Faulkner  received  their  legal  instruction 
from  Judge  Tucker.  In  addition  to  the  pupils  of  the 
school,  Wise  enjoyed  the  acquaintance  of  the  lawyers  of 
the  town,  of  whom  he  wrote  in  a  sketch  of  his  friend  the 
Hon.  James  M.  Mason :  "  The  bench  and  bar  of  Winchester 
and  surrounding  circuits  then,  even  more  than  now,  were 
distinguished  for  eminent  lawyers,  such  as  Henry  St. 
George  Tucker,  Alfred  H.  Powell,  and  John  R.  Cooke,  and 
a  younger  tier  of  professional  devotees,  such  as  the  two 
Marshalls,  the  Conrads,  and  Moses  Hunter,  the  best  wit  of 
them  all." 

Winchester  was  moreover  noted  for  its  excellent  society 


AT  WINCHESTER  23 

and  beautiful  location  in  the  lower  valley  of  the  Shenan- 
doah.  Judge  Tucker  was  accustomed  to  indulge  in  versi 
fication  during  his  leisure  hours,  and  among  his  productions 
was  the  following  satire  on  the  politics  of  the  day. 

"  Hence  if  you  have  a  son,  I  would  advise, 
Lest  his  fair  prospects  you  perchance  may  spoil ; 
'  If  you  would  have  him  in  the  state  to  rise, 
Instead  of  Grotius  let  him  study  Hoyle, 
And  if  his  native  genius  should  betray 
A  turn  for  petty  tricks,  indulge  the  bent; 
It  may  do  service  at  some  future  day. 
A  dexterous  cut  may  rule  a  great  event ; 
And  a  stocked  pack  may  make  a  President ! ' " 

An  anecdote  of  Wise's  stay  at  Winchester,  and  how 
Mrs.  Tucker,  of  whom  he  was  very  fond,  cured  him  of 
gambling,  is  as  follows:  One  Saturday  night  a  circus 
was  in  town  and  he  had  just  received  his  half-year's  allow 
ance.  While  nearly  every  one  else  had  gone  to  the  circus, 
he  went  to  a  faro  bank,  which  was  run  by  a  disreputable 
fellow,  and  there  alone  played  with  the  gambler  until  a 
late  hour,  finally  losing  every  dollar  he  had  received  from 
home.  Just  about  this  time,  the  circus  having  closed,  he 
heard  footsteps  on  the  stairs,  and  in  came  Major  -  — ,  the 
sergeant  of  the  town,  a  bluff  old  chap,  weighing  about  two 
hundred  and  fifty  pounds,  who  was  a  regular  gambler  but 
who  was  very  fond  of  Wise,  and  had  his  good  points.  The 
old  fellow  evidenced  great  surprise  at  finding  him  there 
alone  and  took  in  the  situation  at  a  glance.  Wise  told 
him  the  story  in  a  few  words  and  asked  him  to  lend  him  a 
"  Ben  Hatcher  "  (that  being  the  name  given  to  ten-dollar 
bills  of  the  old  bank  of  Virginia)  to  try  his  luck  once 
more.  "  Yes,"  said  the  Major,  "I'll  lend  you  a  Ben 
Hatcher  and  as  many  as  you  need."  Then  addressing  the 
gambler,  "  You  scoundrel !  You  have  been  robbing  this 


24  THE  LIFE   OF  HENRY  A.  WISE 

boy  up  here  all  alone.  Open  the  game  afresh,  and  under 
stand  you  are  to  play  an  honest  game,  and  if  I  catch 
you  cheating,  I'll  cut  your  ears  off."  Under  these  cheer 
ful  influences  the  game  was  resumed,  and  just  before  day 
break  Wise  rose  from  the  table,  having  won  back  exactly 
what  he  had  lost.  In  the  chill  of  daylight,  he  made  his 
way  back  to  the  tavern  where  he  had  his  rooms,  thinking 
he  would  slip  in  unobserved.  On  the  same  floor  were  the 
rooms  of  Judge  and  Mrs.  Tucker,  and  as  he  stealthily 
reached  the  head  of  the  stairway  Mrs.  Tucker's  door 
opened.  He  started  to  pass  her  by  with  some  word  of 
kindly  greeting  and  expression  of  surprise  at  her  being  up 
at  that  hour,  but  advancing  toward  and  walking  with 
him  she  said,  without  any  trace  of  reproach  in  her  voice, 
"  Yes,  my  dear  child,  I  could  not  sleep.  I  have  had  you  on 
my  mind  very  much  of  late.  I  have  something  here  I  want 
you  to  read,"  and  with  that  she  handed  him  two  tracts, 
and  laying  her  hand  gently  on  his  shoulder  said,  "  Will 
you  read  them?"  and  retired.  He  took  them  to  his  room, 
and  read  them  by  the  early  morning  light.  They  were 
simple,  truthful  narratives  of  the  wreck  of  useful,  honor 
able  lives,  through  yielding  to  the  passion  of  gambling. 
The  lesson  had  its  effect,  not  only  from  what  it  taught, 
but  from  the  manner  in  which  the  rebuke  was  given. 

From  that  day  until  the  day  of  his  death,  Wise  never 
entered  a  gambling-house  as  a  player  and  always  men 
tioned  the  name  of  Mrs.  Tucker  with  reverence  and  love. 


CHAPTER  II 

MARRIAGE     TO     MISS      JENNINGS,      AND      REMOVAL     TO      NASH 
VILLE.    VISIT    TO    THE    " HERMITAGE"    AND    IMPRESSIONS 

OF       UOLD       HICKORY."       PRACTICE       OF       THE       LAW,       AND 
RETURN      TO      VIRGINIA 

WHILE  Wise  was  a  student  at  Washington  College,  in 
1823,  the  Rev.  Obadiah  Jennings  accepted  the  pastorate 
of  the  Presbyterian  Church  in  that  town ;  and  not  long 
after  the  former  found  himself  deep  in  love  with  the 
latter's  daughter  Ann.  Although  Wise  remained  at  col 
lege  until  the  fall  of  1825,  he  had  never  had  the  courage 
to  address  her,  as  he  acknowledged  in  a  letter  to  a  friend, 
nor  did  he  realize  that  his  affection  was  returned.  Later 
on,  he  had  begun  the  study  of  law  at  Winchester,  had  aban 
doned  all  thought  of  courting  her,  and  had  devoted  him 
self  assiduously  to  his  legal  studies.  While  a  pupil  at 
Judge  Tucker's  law  school,  in  the  spring  of  1827,  he  had 
learned  from  a  friend  in  Philadelphia  that  his  old  sweet 
heart,  who  had  been  spending  the  winter  in  that  city,  was 
to  pass  within  about  forty  miles  of  Winchester,  on  her  way 
to  Washington,  Pennsylvania.  His  former  ardor  was  forth 
with  awakened,  for  he  set  out  to  join  her,  and  pressed  his 
suit  with  such  success  that  the  young  couple  became 
engaged. 

The  Rev.  Obadiah  Jennings,  the  father  of  his  betrothed, 
received  a  call  to  become  the  pastor  of  the  First  Presby 
terian  Church  in  Nashville,  Tennessee,  whither  he  moved 

25 


26  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

during  the  summer  of  1828,  and  the  family  persuaded 
Wise  to  locate  there  for  the  practice  of  his  profession,  as 
the  pair  were  to  be  married  that  fall.  After  two  years 
spent  under  the  instruction  of  Judge  Tucker,  Wise  grad 
uated  from  his  school,  and  returned  to  Accomack,  where 
he  cast  his  maiden  vote  for  Andrew  Jackson  in  1828. 
Tidewater  Virginia,  even  at  that  date,  had  long  before 
seen  its  best  days  and  afforded  but  a  poor  opportunity  to  a 
young  man  beginning  the  practice  of  law  ;  moreover  Wise 
wrote  of  it :  "I  have  actually  found  the  place,  dear  as  it 
is  to  me,  after  having  left  it  and  returned,  to  be  paraly- 
tick  to  my  energy.  I  will  not  attempt  to  account  for  the 
phenomenon  of  always  being  in  a  state  of  mental  lethargy 
and  corporeal  torpidity  when  there.  I  know  not  whether 
it  was  owing  to  the  atmosphere  or  to  better  eating  than  I 
ever  got  anywhere  else,  but  so  it  was ;  and  Captain  Smith, 
in  his  history  of  the  settlement  of  the  Virginia  colony, 
describes  the  climate  of  Accomack,  named  after  the 
Indian l  chief,  who  was  patriarch  of  the  tribe  on  the  East 
ern  Shore,  as  salubrious,  the  soil  as  fertile,  the  place 
altogether  adapted  to  a  settlement  that  he  established  at 
Onancock,  but  noticed  that  the  aborigines  were  inactive 
and  lazy."  Thus,  Wise  was  induced  to  leave  his  native 
peninsula  and  cast  his  lot  in  the  new  and  flourishing 
town  of  Nashville. 

During  the  month  of  August,  1828,  having  procured 
his  license  to  practise,  he  set  out  via  the  Chesapeake  for 
Baltimore  on  his  way  to  Tennessee.  Of  this  trip  he  wrote  in 
his  old  age  : 2  "  We  stopped  at  Tangier  Island  in  the  Chesa 
peake  Bay,  there  to  part  with  kindred  and  friends  who 
accompanied  us  to  the  island,  where  was  held  the  annual 

1  This  is  probably  an  error,  as  Accomack  was  not  called  after  a  chief, 
but  on  account  of  its  location,  as  stated  in  the  opening  chapter. 

2  "  Seven  Decades  of  the  Union." 


REMOVAL    AND    MARRIAGE  27 

camp-meeting  of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church.  Love 
and  plighted  troth  urged  us  to  fly  with  swift  wings  west 
ward  and  the  '  amor  loci '  drew  us  back  to  4  Home  in  old 
Virginia.'  .  .  .  The  camp  of  1828  was  most  numer 
ously  attended.  We  had  started  in  a  sail-vessel  from  a 
beautiful  creek  late  in  the  evening  and  when  within  about 
two  miles  of  the  beach  the  breeze  died  away  and  we  were 
helplessly  becalmed.  The  sun  set  clear  o'er  the  bay,  smooth 
and  rippleless  like  a  mirror  of  the  Almighty ;  in  a  few  mo 
ments  the  island  was  not  to  be  seen  until  the  moon  efful 
gent  rose  o'er  the  eastern  land  and  lighted  up  the  glassy 
waters,  and  she  had  not  risen  high  when  suddenly  the  light- 
wood  flambeaux  of  the  camp  shot  forth  their  beams,  and 
the  rows  and  avenues  of  hundreds  of  broad  and  high  blazes 
were  like  supernatural  lamps  of  the  heavens;  and  soon 
the  hymns  of  the  multitude  came  softly  stealing  by  moon 
light  o'er  the  mirrored  bay,  mellowed  by  distance,  as  if 
angel  voices  were  in  choirs  of  melody  coming  from  an 
island  cloud !  Oh  it  was  sweet  beyond  fancy's  dreams  ! 
We  could  not  but  exclaim  4  that  is  the  anthem  of  farewell 
to  home  and  friends,  and  that  is  the  cloud-music  giving 
welcome  to  the  West  and  to  active  life  !  Here  is  a  start 
with  good  omen ! '  Tears  both  of  joy  and  grief  were 
wept ! " 

From  Baltimore  he  drove  in  a  one-horse  gig,  with  a 
little  hair  trunk  tied  up  behind  by  way  of  baggage ;  and 
his  money,  consisting  of  about  1800  was  carried  in  a  belt 
around  his  waist,  which  caused  him  to  arrive  in  Nashville, 
considerably  chafed  at  the  end  of  the  month's  trip. 

On  the  8th  of  October,  1828,  the  marriage  took  place, 
and  the  day  following,  the  wedding  party  repaired  to  the 
"  Hermitage  "  as  the  guest  of  General  Jackson,  who  was  a 
warm  friend  as  well  as  parishioner  of  the  Rev.  Dr.  Jen 
nings.  The  bridesmaids  and  groomsmen  went  on  horse- 


28  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

back  and  the  bride  and  groom  in  the  gig.  "  We  arrived 
at  the  4  Hermitage '  to  dinner,"  says  Wise,  "  and  were 
shown  to  a  bridal  chamber  magnificently  furnished  with 
articles  which  were  the  rich  and  costly  presents  of  the 
city  of  New  Orleans  to  its  noble  defender. 

"Had  we  not  seen  General  Jackson  before,  we  would 
have  taken  him  for  a  visitor,  not  the  host  of  the  mansion. 
He  greeted  us  cordially  and  bade  us  feel  at  home,  but 
gave  us  to  distinctly  understand  that  he  took  no  trouble  to 
look  after  any  but  his  lady  guests ;  as  for  the  gentlemen, 
there  were  the  parlors,  dining  room,  the  library,  the  side 
board  and  its  refreshments  —  there  were  the  servants,  and 
if  anything  was  wanting  all  that  was  necessary  was  to  ring. 
He  was  as  good  as  his  word.  He  did  not  sit  at  the  head 
of  his  table,  but  mingled  with  his  guests,  and  always  pre 
ferred  a  seat  between  two  ladies,  obviously  seeking  a  chair 
between  different  ones  at  various  times.  He  was  very 
easy  and  graceful  in  his  attentions ;  free  and  often  play 
ful,  but  always  dignified  and  earnest  in  his  conversa 
tion.  .  .  .  The  cost  of  the  coming  presidency  was  even 
then  very  great  and  burdensome ;  but  the  General  showed 
no  signs  of  impatience  and  was  alive  and  active  in  his 
attentions  to  all  comers  and  goers.  He  affected  no  style 
and  put  on  no  airs  of  greatness,  but  was  plain  and  simple, 
though  impulsively  polite  to  all."  Among  the  household  at 
the  "Hermitage"  were  several  of  Mrs.  Jackson's  family, 
Judge  Overton,  an  intimate  friend  of  the  General's,  and 
Henry  Lee,  half-brother  of  General  Robert  E.  Lee,  who 
resided  there  for  the  time  and  was  engaged  in  preparing 
Jackson's  campaign  papers.  After  a  delightful  visit  of  a 
few  days,  the  young  couple  returned  to  Nashville,  where 
they  made  their  home  with  Dr.  Jennings,  and  Wise  began 
the  practice  of  law.  Shortly  after  coming  to  the  bar,  he 
formed  a  partnership  with  Thomas  Duncan,  Esq.,  a  brother 


LAW   PRACTICE  IN  NASHVILLE  29 

of  Governor  Duncan  of  Illinois,  which,  however,  did  not 
long  continue.  Later  on  Duncan  became  involved  in  a 
duel  which  was  fought  on  the  Mississippi  above  New 
Orleans,  in  which  he  was  run  through  the  body  and 
killed. 

Among  those  with  whom  Wise  was  brought  in  contact 
in  the  practice  of  his  profession,  were  Felix  Grundy, 
Francis  B.  Fogg,  Baillie  Peyton,  Ephraim  H.  Foster,  An 
drew  Hays,  O.  B.  Hays,  Thomas  Fletcher,  and  others, 
then  prominent  at  the  bar  of  Nashville.  His  letters  of 
that  period  relate  the  usual  tedious  experience  of  most 
young  lawyers  before  and  since,  in  waiting  for  practice, 
and  although  he  was  not  inclined  to  hide  his  light  under  a 
bushel,  he  wrote  that  his  clients  were  few  and  far  between. 
During  this  period  of  waiting  he  frequently  amused  him 
self  by  writing  articles  for  the  press,  as  he  began  early  to 
take  an  interest  in  public  affairs. 

Nashville  was  at  that  date  a  flourishing  town  of  between 
four  and  five  thousand  inhabitants,  and  the  centre  of  a  con 
siderable  cotton  trade.  Cavalier  manners  and  customs 
prevailed,  and  all  the  vices  and  characteristics  of  a  new 
southwestern  town  existed ;  and  there  was  a  full  share  of 
paper-shavers  and  adventurers,  along  with  a  highly  intelli 
gent,  refined  society,  and  a  class  of  resolute  men  who  had 
left  the  older  States  along  the  seaboard  to  seek  their  for 
tunes  in  the  western  country.  Of  Wise's  life  in  Nashville 
there  is  not  much  to  tell,  but  it  is  interesting  to  note,  as 
indicative  of  his  views  about  slavery  at  that  time,  also 
as  to  his  habits  of  life,  that  he  was  the  secretary  of  the 
Tennessee  Colonization  Society,  and  an  active  member  in 
a  temperance  organization.  The  following  spring  after 
his  location  in  Nashville  he  made  a  trip  westward  through 
Tennessee,  with  a  view  to  purchasing  a  plantation,  for  the 
reason,  as  he  wrote  in  a  letter  to  one  of  his  college  mates, 


30  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

"  I  may  say,  without  a  particular  detail  of  circumstances, 
that  I  find  it  absolutely  necessary  to  bring  my  slaves  to 
this  cotton  country,  and  most  advisable  to  settle  them, 
immediately,  on  a  plantation  of  my  own,  in  order  to  assist 
my  quota  of  fees  in  the  profession  in  defraying  the  exorbi 
tant  expenses  of  this  very  fashionably  extravagant  city." 
He  visited  the  country  bordering  on  the  Mississippi,  in  the 
neighborhood  of  what  he  describes  as  "  a  very  flourishing 
town  called  Memphis,"  and  was  on  the  eve  of  purchasing 
a  rich  tract  of  land,  consisting  of  six  hundred  and  fifty 
acres,  for  $2000.  It  was  his  intention  to  bring  his  slaves 
from  "  the  old  worn-out  sand  banks  of  the  Mother  of  the 
Union  "  and  settle  them  here,  to  plant  cotton,  and  he  ex 
pected  to  induce  his  brother-in-law  and  relative,  Tully  R. 
Wise,  to  come  out  and  take  charge  of  the  plantation  for 
him  while  he  remained  in  Nashville.  The  profits  arising 
from  cotton  planting  in  a  new  country,  and  the  natural 
increase  in  a  body  of  slaves,  were  very  large,  and  Wise 
had  high  expectations ;  but  his  project  was  abandoned, 
doubtless  on  account  of  the  determination  of  his  brother- 
in-law  to  remain  in  Virginia.  Despite  the  fact  that  for 
a  while  he  was  a  briefless  barrister,  Wise  gradually 
acquired  a  good  share  of  practice  for  a  young  attorney, 
and  a  little  more  than  a  year  after  coming  to  the  bar,  he 
was  called  upon  to  argue  a  case  in  the  Supreme  Court 
of  the  State,  where  he  maintained  his  client's  cause 
with  credit  to  himself,  though  he  was  unsuccessful.  Ham- 
bleton  tells  us :  "  But  despite  all  that  he  could  do,  he 
was  unhappy  outside  his  native  State.  There  is  something 
peculiar  about  Virginians  in  this  respect.  We  rarely  if 
ever  find  one,  no  matter  how  well  he  may  be  doing,  satis 
fied  for  any  length  of  time  in  any  State  but  his  own.  Why 
it  is,  remains  to  be  solved.  Finally,  to  gratify  the  wish 
of  his  heart,  he  determined,  with  the  consent  of  his  wife, 


RETURN  TO   ACCOMACK  31 

to  return  to  Accomack,  which  he  did  in  the  fall  of  1830. 
When  he  arrived  at  home,  the  scenes  of  his  boyhood  ex 
hilarated  and  enlivened  a  feeble  frame,  which  had  almost 
fallen  a  prey  to  melancholy." 

In  the  spring  of  1831  Wise  wrote  from  Accomack :  "  I 
never  declared  my  intention  to  remain  among  this  people 
until  about  first  of  January  last,  and  from  that  time  until 
this  my  business  has  been  constantly  increasing.  So  far 
my  practice  has  been  worth  for  the  first  three  months 
$325.  I  am  as  popular  as  I  could  wish,  but  have  no  dis 
position  to  dabble  in  politics  so  long  as  my  profession 
thrives."  His  intention,  however,  not  to  embark  in  a 
political  career,  was  not  destined  to  be  fulfilled ;  for  al 
though  he  soon  acquired  a  lucrative  practice,  yet  he 
possessed  in  a  more  than  ordinary  degree  a  Virginian's 
weakness  for  politics. 

At  the  bar  of  Accomack  and  Northampton,  he  crossed 
lances  with  George  P.  Scarburgh,  Carter  M.  Braxton, 
P.  P.  Mayo,  M.  W.  Fisher,  and  Vespasian  Ellis  —  men 
who  were  types  of  the  old  county  court  lawyer,  and  some 
of  whom  could  hold  their  own  with  the  best  anywhere. 

For  the  first  year  or  more,  after  his  return  from  Tennes 
see,  Wise  made  his  home  in  the  village  of  Onancock,  on 
the  bay  side  of  the  peninsula.  Later  on  he  moved  to  a 
farm  near  the  county  seat,  Drummondtown,  where  his  life 
was  that  of  the  lawyer  and  planter  combined,  so  common 
in  the  country  at  that  time.  "  Such  a  lawyer,"  as  said  a 
distinguished  jurist  of  our  day,1  "lived  upon  his  farm, 
which  he  cultivated,  and  attended  the  courts,  without  any 
strict  devotion  to  business  in  his  office.  His  library  was 
not  measured  by  the  number  but  the  weight  of  his  books. 
He  read  and  mastered  Bracton,  Coke,  Hale,  and  Blackstone. 

1  John  Eandolph  Tucker's  address  on  the  character  of  Beverly  B. 
Douglas. 


32  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY  A.  WISE 

His  reports  were  few  —  My  Lord  Coke's,  Salkeld,  Saun- 
ders,  Atkyns'  Equity  Cases,  and  the  like.  He  read  history 
much  and  studied  the  human  heart  profoundly.  Amid 
the  mountains,  hills,  valleys,  forests,  and  fields  about  his 
country  home,  he  meditated  much  upon  natural  law.  The 
principle  of  right  and  justice,  implanted  in  the  instincts  of 
our  nature  and  deducible  from  observation  and  experience, 
he  evolved  from  his  own  native  intuitions  and  reasons. 
"  He  wrought  out  by  original  thought  what  law  ought  to  be, 
without  learning  much  from  the  decisions  of  the  judges, 
and  thus  in  ninety-nine  cases  in  a  hundred  he  found  what 
was  the  law  in  any  special  controversy.  He  was  less 
technical  than  the  city  lawyer,  skilled  by  ample  practice 
and  full  libraries  in  the  infinitely  varied  phases  of  social 
contacts  and  contracts.  He  was  less  scientific,  but  more 
philosophic ;  his  views  were  less  astute,  probably,  but  more 
broad  and  fundamental,  and  his  generalizations  less  accu 
rate,  because  deduced  from  a  less  number  of  particulars. 
The  law  he  learned  was  that  whose  '  seat  is  the  bosom  of 
God,  and  whose  voice  is  the  harmony  of  the  world ' :  Nee 
enim  alia  lex  Romse,  alia  Athenis,  alia  nunc,  alia  posthac, 
sed  et  omnes  gentes,  et  omni  tempore,  una  lex  et  sempi- 
terna  et  immutabilis  continebit." 

Wise's  skill  in  extemporaneous  speaking  gave  him  great 
power  before  a  jury,  especially  in  criminal  cases,  and  his 
ready  knowledge  of  human  nature,  coupled  with  a  faculty 
of  making  acquaintances,  caused  him  to  rise  rapidly  at 
the  bar,  and  a  successful  career  lay  before  him  in  that 
direction.  At  the  period  when  he  began  the  practice  in 
Accomack,  it  was  the  custom  of  the  lawyers  to  attend 
the  warrant  tryings  every  month,  in  the  various  magis 
terial  districts,  and  here  the  legal  fledglings  tried  their 
wings,  as  well  as  on  County  Court  day,  that  "  folk  moot " 
of  the  Virginians,  when  the  sovereigns  gathered  from 


COUNTY   COURT  33 

afar  to  hear  the  lawyers  argue  their  cases,  or  the  public 
speakers  discuss  the  issues  of  the  day  upon  the  Court 
green,  where  the  crowd  could  also  amuse  themselves 
swapping  horses,  examining  the  wares  of  the  pedler,  or 
in  witnessing  the  fights  of  the  local  bullies.  On  these 
occasions  intercourse  was  had  with  the  people  from  every 
portion  of  the  shore,  and  Wise  formed  acquaintances  which 
were  to  prove  of  great  value  in  the  political  career  which 
lay  before  him.  His  ready  faculty  of  making  friends  and 
his  kinship  with  many  of  the  leading  families  of  the  county 
caused  him  to  attain  a  high  degree  of  popularity  while 
yet  a  very  young  man. 


CHAPTER  III 

POLITICAL  VIEWS    AND    ELECTION    TO    CONGRESS.       PERSONAL 
APPEARANCE.       DUEL   WITH    RICHARD    COKE 

ALTHOUGH  a  member  of  a  family  which  was  Federalist 
on  both  sides,  Wise  from  boyhood  was  an  ardent  Democrat, 
and  concerning  his  political  views  at  that  time,  wrote : 
"  My  master  in  the  study  of  municipal  and  constitutional 
law  was  a  Republican  after  the  4  straightest  sect '  of  strict 
constructionists,  —  the  learned  and  now  lamented  Henry 
St.  George  Tucker  of  Winchester,  —  than  whom  no  man 
in  the  day  of  his  health  was  of  more  subtle  intellect,  no 
man  more  a  gentleman  and  a  scholar,  and  no  man  more 
beloved  by  his  pupils,  upon  whom  he  failed  not  to  impress 
the  stamp  of  his  great  authority.  He  led  me  to  the  pure 
fountain  of  the  Madisonian  philosophy  of  politics.  The 
first  of  leaders  whom  I  preferred  for  the  presidency  was 
Mr.  Crawford  of  Georgia,  though  I  was  too  young  to  give 
him  a  vote,  even  if  the  state  of  his  health  had  allowed 
him  to  be  nominated.  My  next  preference  was  for  Gen 
eral  Jackson,  who  was  my  first  choice  in  1828,  and  for 
whom  I  voted  then  and  in  1832."  Upon  his  return  from 
Judge  Tucker's  law  school  in  1828,  before  his  departure 
for  Nashville,  Wise,  then  not  twenty  years  of  age,  deliv 
ered  an  eloquent  speech  from  the  hustings  in  advocacy 
of  the  election  of  "  Old  Hickory."  Four  years  later  —  in 
1832  —  he  was  sent  as  a  delegate  from  his  district  to  the 
Baltimore  convention,  where  he  voted  for  the  renomina- 

34 


ENTRANCE   INTO   POLITICS  35 

tion  of  Jackson  for  President,  but  declined  to  acquiesce 
in  the  nomination  of  Van  Buren  for  Vice-President,  and, 
like  many  others  in  Virginia  and  Alabama,  cast  his  vote 
for  Philip  P.  B arbour  of  Virginia  for  that  office.  After 
the  adjournment  of  the  convention,  he  was  appointed 
one  of  the  "  Jackson  Corresponding  Committee  "  for  his 
county,  and  wrote  an  address  urging  Jackson's  reelection 
and  condemning  the  policy  of  Clay,  especially  upon  the 
subject  of  the  tariff  and  internal  improvements. 

In  December,  1832,  the  issue  of  nullification  had  arisen 
in  South  Carolina,  and  Jackson  issued  his  celebrated  Proc 
lamation.  Many  of  the  Virginia  democracy  sympathized 
with  the  nullification  doctrine  and  took  sides  with  South 
Carolina,  and  it  was  largely  through  the  influence  of  the 
Richmond  Enquirer  and  prominent  Democrats  like  Drom- 
goole,  John  Y.  Mason,  Andrew  Stevenson,  and  Philip  P. 
Barbour,  that  Virginia  was  saved  from  embracing  the 
South  Carolina  heresy.  The  district  in  which  Wise  lived, 
generally  known  as  the  "  York  "  district,  was  composed  of 
the  counties  of  York,  Gloucester,  Matthews,  Warwick, 
James  City  and  the  city  of  Williamsburg,  on  the  western 
side  of  the  Chesapeake,  and  the  counties  of  Accomack  and 
Northampton  on  the  eastern  shore.  It  was  the  oldest 
section  of  the  State,  in  which  were  located  not  only  the 
old  Colonial  Capitol  and  historic  Yorktown,  but  James 
town  Island,  where  the  earliest  colonists  had  made  their 
home.  In  an  address,  delivered  at  the  last-named  spot, 
upon  the  two  hundredth  and  fiftieth  anniversary  of  the 
English  settlement,  Wise  said :  "  Here  the  Old  World  first 
met  the  New.  Here  the  white  man  first  met  the  red,  for 
settlement  and  colonization.  Here  the  white  man  first 
wielded  the  axe  to  cut  the  first  tree,  for  the  first  log  cabin. 
Here  the  first  log  cabin  was  built  for  the  first  village. 
Here  the  first  village  rose  to  be  the  first  State  Capitol.  Here 


36  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

was  the  first  capitol  of  our  empire  of  States,  —  here  was  the 
very  foundation  of  a  nation  of  freemen  which  has  stretched 
its  dominion  and  its  millions  across  the  continent  to  the 
shores  of  another  ocean.  Go  to  the  Pacific  now,  to  meas 
ure  the  progression  and  power  of  a  great  people ! " 

As  late  as  1833,  despite  the  decline  of  the  tidewater 
section,  generally,  from  the  long  cultivation  of  tobacco  in 
previous  years  and  the  effects  of  slavery,  as  well  as  the 
removal  of  many  of  its  leading  families  to  other  portions 
of  the  country,  the  district  still  continued  to  be  the  home 
of  a  refined,  intelligent  agricultural  population  of  English 
descent,  among  whom  the  best  traditions  of  the  Common 
wealth  still  survived. 

Along  the  banks  of  the  lower  James,  known  among  the 
strictly  orthodox  as  the  Jeems  River,  there  dwelt  in  glazed 
brick  houses  a  few  of  that  class,  who,  from  their  aristocratic 
pretentious,  arrogated  to  themselves  a  sort  of  superiority 
over  the  common  clay  of  humanity,  yet  the  great  mass  and 
controlling  element  were  marked  by  that  democratic  spirit 
.and  simplicity  of  dress  and  manners  which  have  always 
•characterized  the  Virginia  people,  as  a  whole.  Wise's 
brother-in-law,  a  Pennsylvanian,  wrote  him  of  a  visit  to 
the  former's  home  in  Accomack,  in  which  he  gives  his  im 
pression  of  the  people  as  follows :  "  The  winter  was  passed 
very  pleasantly,  and  if  you  had  been  here,  my  dear  brother, 
I  would  have  classed  it  among  one  of  the  very  pleasantest 
of  my  life,  for  the  frank  manners  of  the  Virginians  are 
more  congenial  to  my  feelings  than  those  of  the  city  of 
aristocracy,  where  before  sociability  can  be  established  you 
must  either  possess  the  mines  of  Mexico  or  trace  your 
« descent  from  'Tara's  Halls.'  Yet  do  not  understand  me 
as  not  being  pleased  with  the  Philadelphians ;  I  was  only 
.contrasting  their  manners  with  those  of  the  Old  Dominion." 

In  the  spring  of  1833  Richard  Coke  of  Williamsburg, 


RUNNING  FOR   CONGRESS  37 

who  represented  the  district  at  that  time,  was  a  candidate 
for  reelection  and  openly  espoused  the  nullification  cause. 
An  appeal  was  made  to  the  Jackson  party  on  the  eastern 
shore,  to  put  forward  a  candidate,  and  several  gentlemen 
were  solicited  to  announce  themselves,  among  them  Wise, 
and  upon  the  others  declining  to  run,  he  declared  himself, 
in  the  race,  in  January,  1833.  He  forthwith  published  an 
address  to  the  voters  of  the  district,  defining  his  position 
upon  the  questions  then  before  the  people,  which  Mr./ 
Ritchie  in  the  Enquirer  characterized  as  "  a  masterly  ref 
utation  of  many  of  the  errors  of  the  day,  the  doctrines  of 
Consolidation  as  well  as  of  Nullification" 

In  it  he  planted  himself  upon  the  principle  enunciated 
in  the  Virginia  resolutions  of  1798-99,  drawn  by  Madison,/ 
"  that  each  State  for  itself  is  the  judge  of  the  infraction 
and  of  the  mode  and  manner  of  redress,"  which,  however, 
Mr.  Madison  "  applied  in  cases  of  last  resort  for  the  con 
servation  of  inalienable  rights,  and  Mr.  Calhoun  applied  it 
in  cases  of  governmental  policy  and  expediency.  But  as 
applicable  to  any  class  of  cases,  Mr.  Calhoun,  in  fact, 
changed,  and,  as  we  think,  essentially  perverted  the  true 
doctrine,  and  thus  caused  it  to  be  misunderstood  and  mis 
applied  until  it  was  brought  into  disrepute  and  was  finally 
overthrown,  if  not  forever  destroyed."  Wise  believed  that 
milder  means  should  have  been  used  by  Jackson  and  that 
the  tariff  bill  could  have  been  "  compromised  before  the 
ordinance  of  South  Carolina  was  passed,  as  it  was  after 
ward."  An  exceedingly  warm  and  bitter  campaign  en 
sued,  between  Coke  and  Wise,  both  speaking  from  the 
hustings  and  holding  joint  debates,  at  times,  in  accordance 
with  the  Virginia  custom;  and  the  latter  delivered,  as 
he  afterward  declared,  "  as  many  as  twenty-seven  stump 
speeches,  besides  having  one  hundred  and  fifty  cross-road 
skirmishes." 


38  THE   LIFE   OF   HENKY   A.  WISE 

A  resident  of  Northampton  County,  James  B.  Dalby, 
Esq.,  thus  gives  his  recollections  of  Wise  during  the  cam 
paign:  "I  was  only  a  boy,  but  his  eloquence,  his  frank 
cordial  manners,  his  honesty  of  purpose,  that  seemed  to 
speak  out  from  his  looks  and  countenance,  possessed  a 
charm  for  me  that  time  has  not  dimmed,  nor  circumstances 
changed.  There  were  still  other  powers  of  attraction.  My 
father,  besides  being  a  strong  Jackson  man,  was  an  old- 
fashioned  Methodist  and  a  zealous  advocate  of  temperance. 
Mr.  Wise  was  what  was  called  a  teetotaler,  —  he  did  not 
drink  nor  treat  to  ardent  spirits,  which  was  an  unusual  thing 
for  a  candidate  for  office,  —  therefore  my  father  thought  him 
not  only  a  great  but  a  good  man,  and  so  educated  me  to 
believe."  Wise  at  this  period  was  a  stranger  to  the  people 
of  the  York  district,  outside  of  Accomack  and  Northampton 
Counties,  and  they  beheld  for  the  first  time,  on  the  hust 
ings,  a  tall  young  man,  about  five  feet  eleven  inches  in 
height,  and  thin  as  a  rail,  of  fair  complexion,  with  light 
auburn  hair,  almost  flaxen,  worn  long  behind  the  ears,  and 
deep-set,  piercing  hazel  eyes,  which  at  times  appeared  gray 
ish  in  color.  His  forehead,  though  low,  was  broad,  with 
great  depth  between  the  temples ;  nose,  Roman,  and  large 
firmly  set  mouth,  above  a  square  chin,  furrowed  down  the 
centre.  His  general  appearance  was  exceedingly  youthful, 
and  his  pronounced  features  and  clean-shaven  face  added 
to  the  Indian  look  about  him. 

Although  embarked  upon  his  first  campaign,  he  showed 
himself  not  only  an  eloquent  but  ready  speaker,  possess 
ing  a  clear,  resonant  voice,  and  capable  of  holding  his  own 
upon  the  hustings,  among  a  people  accustomed  to  hear 
the  political  issues  discussed  by  orators  of  more  than  or 
dinary  powers.  It  is  related  that  upon  one  occasion,  while 
speaking  on  a  court  green  during  a  canvass  he  was  con 
stantly  interrupted  by  a  man,  who  injected  his  remarks 


ELECTION  TO   OFFICE  39 

and  attempted  witticisms  at  the  end  of  almost  every  sen 
tence.  Assuming  a  look  of  injured  innocence,  Wise  said, 
addressing  the  crowd,  "  My  fellow-citizens,  when  this 
Solomon  has  finished  I  will  proceed  with  my  speech."  The 
eyes  of  the  audience  were  immediately  fastened  upon  the 
noisy  individual,  who,  much  incensed,  demanded  a  retrac 
tion  of  the  remark.  "  Yes,  my  fellow-citizens,"  continued 
Wise,  who  assumed  an  air  of  mock  humility,  "  I  will  cheer 
fully  retract  it,  for  he  is  no  Solomon" 

The  nullification  doctrine  was  espoused  by  Abel  P. 
Upsher,  Severn  E.  Parker,  and  other  leading  men  of  the 
district,  and  was  widely  believed  in,  as  the  vote  polled  at 
the  election  indicated.  Coke  carried  all  the  counties  on 
the  western  side  of  the  Chesapeake,  by  large  majorities, 
Wise  receiving  but  one  vote  in  James  City ;  but  if  the 
western  shore  was  loyal  to  its  candidate,  the  eastern  shore 
was  even  more  so  to  Wise,  and  he  received  there  an  over 
whelming  majority,  which  more  than  offset  the  vote  cast  , 
on  the  western  shore,  and  elected  him  by  401  votes.  From 
this  it  may  be  accurately  inferred,  however,  that  the  politi 
cal  issues  did  not  enter  as  largely  into  the  canvass,  as  the 
rivalry  between  the  different  sections  of  the  district  on 
either  side  of  the  bay. 

It  is  interesting  to  recall  an  abstract  from  a  speech  deliv 
ered  by  Wise,  some  years  afterward,  in  1841,  upon  the 
floor  of  Congress,  which  may  be  said  to  convey  a  truthful 
impression  of  the  feelings  among  the  Union  Democrats  of 
Virginia,  upon  the  subject  of  Jackson's  intended  coercion 
of  South  Carolina.  Said  he  :  "I  was  no  nullifier.  I  op 
posed  the  doctrine.  I  opposed  the  theory  upon  which  the 
resistance  was  founded.  I  defeated  its  advocate  in  an 
election  for  a  seat  on  this  floor ;  I  was  a  Union  man  and 
for  peace.  But  let  me  tell,  gentlemen,  that  if  war  hadl^ 
begun,  every  Union  man  of  Virginia  would  have  been  a 


40  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

Southern  man.  No  standing  army  would  ever  have 
crossed  her  ancient  lines  to  do  battle  against  a  sovereign 
State,  without  first  fighting  her  sons  of  every  faith  at  every 
pass  where  volunteers  could  have  made  a  stand.  Why? 
Because,  sir,  when  the  torch  of  civil  war  between  this 
government  and  a  State  had  once  been  lighted,  the  Union 
would  have  been  dissolved.  Once  a  war,  never  more  a 
Union  —  a  Union  as  a  Union  has  existed  and  should  exist. 
After  a  war  of  that  kind,  it  would  have  been  a  Union 
of  consolidation  cemented  by  blood  !  —  such  a  Union  as  no 
Union  man  of  my  acquaintance  would  have  been  willing 
to  see  exist."  The  bitter  contest  between  Coke  and  Wise, 
aggravated  by  the  intemperate  zeal  of  the  friends  of  both 
parties,  resulted  in  a  correspondence  between  them,  in 
which  Coke  sought  to  hold  Wise  responsible  for  certain 
criticisms  of  his  character  and  political  views.  The  matter 
blew  over  at  the  time,  but  the  animosity  had  not  subsided, 
and  in  January,  1835,  nearly  two  years  afterward,  Wise 
wrote  from  Washington,  to  a  friend  at  home,  alluding  to 
a  correspondence  between  his  second  and  that  of  Coke. 
"  Wray  writes  Coke  has  been  seen  some  time  at  Hampton 
4  Barking  trees.'  I  am  ready  and  have  learned  in  quick 
time  to  be  so  by  boring  holes  in  chalk  lines."  The  duel 
was  fought  about  the  hour  of  noon,  on  the  22d  of  Jan 
uary,  over  the  eastern  branch  of  the  Potomac,  just  across 
the  district  lines.  The  distance  stepped  off  was  ten  paces. 
Wise  wrote  of  the  affair  to  a  friend  at  home,  Captain 
Stephen  Hopkins,  as  follows :  "  It  will  give  no  one  more 
relief  from  anxiety  and  concern  on  my  account  than  your 
self,  to  be  informed  that  I  have  fought  Coke,  and  escaped 
unhurt.  I  wounded  him  through  the  right  elbow  joint, 
the  ball  passing  to  the  centre  of  his  side,  but  not  quite 
through  his  coat.  It  raised  a  contusion,  however,  and  cut 
the  skin  on  a  rib  opposite  his  heart.  He  will  soon  recover, 


A  DUEL  WITH  COKE  41 

and  I  thank  God  sincerely  I  did  not  kill  him."  The  effect 
of  Wise's  shot  had  been  to  destroy  Coke's  aim,  and  the 
ball  from  the  latter's  pistol  struck  the  ground  a  few  paces 
in  front  of  the  former.  After  this  exchange  of  shots,  the 
parties  shook  hands  and  the  affair  ended.  Coke  opposed 
Wise  during  the  succeeding  congressional  campaign,  but 
during  the  canvass  announced  his  withdrawal,  and  ever 
afterward  voted  for  Wise  and  also  visited  him  at  his  home 
in  Accomack. 

Wise  was  never  before  or  afterward  the  principal  in  a 
duel,  though  prior  to  the  meeting  with  Coke,  he  had  chal 
lenged  his  cousin  Thomas  H.  Bayly,  who  had  declined 
to  accept.  Several  years  later  he  became  involved  in  a 
difficulty  with  Mr.  Gholson  of  Mississippi,  to  whom  he 
addressed  a  challenge,  but  Sargent  S.  Prentiss,  who 
acted  as  Wise's  second,  declined  to  deliver  it  and  the 
affair  was  amicably  adjusted. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE     TWENTY-THIRD    CONGRESS.        THE     DEBATES     OVER    THE 
ABOLITION    PETITIONS.      JOHN     QUINCY    ADAMS 

DURING  the  month  of  December,  1833,  Wise  took  his 
seat  as  a  member  of  the  Twenty-third  Congress,  a  body 
which,  as  Parton  observes,  owing  to  the  number  of  distin 
guished  men  it  contained,  has  been  called  the  star  Con 
gress.  In  the  Senate  sat  Webster,  Clay,  and  Calhoun  the 
great  triumvirate,  besides  a  number  of  other  lights  of 
scarcely  less  magnitude ;  while  among  the  members  of  the 
House  were  John  Quincy  Adams,  the  "old  man  eloquent," 
Pierce,  Choate,  Cambreleng,  Fillmore,  McDuffie,  Polk, 
Corwin,  and  Ewing.  "  Of  the  members  of  this  Congress," 
says  Parton,  "five  have  been  President ;  five  Vice-President; 
eight  Secretary  of  State  ;  twenty-five  governor  of  a  State." 

Wise  was  just  twenty-seven  years  of  age  when  he  quali 
fied  as  a  member  of  the  House,  and  his  clean-shaven  face 
and  slender  frame  gave  him  an  exceedingly  boyish  appear 
ance,  and  Hambleton  relates  that  when  John  Y.  Mason 
introduced  him  to  the  Speaker,  Andrew  Stevenson,  to  take 
the  oath,  the  latter  inquired,  "  Where  is  Mr.  Wise  ? " 
Mr.  Wise  then  standing  before  him,  whom  he  took  to  be  one 
of  the  pages  of  the  House.  Mr.  Mason  whispered  to  the 
Speaker  and  told  him  that  was  the  gentleman  to  whom  he 
had  just  been  introduced.  "  The  Speaker,"  continues 
Hambleton,  "  smiled  and  presented  the  Bible  with  a  pleas 
ant  remark  about  his  youthful  appearance."1 

1  A  similar  story  is  related  of  John  Randolph  of  Roanoke. 
42 


THE  TWENTY-THIRD   CONGRESS  43 

At  this  period  of  American  history,  the  generation  of 
statesmen  belonging  to  the  Revolutionary  era  had  for  the 
most  part  passed  away,  and  the  effect  of  the  new  frontier 
States  upon  our  national  life  had  begun  to  be  felt ;  railway 
construction  had  commenced,  sectional  irritation  over  the 
tariff  had  arisen,  and  the  slavery  agitation  begun  by  peti 
tions  presented  to  Congress,  and,  in  short,  those  questions 
were  coming  to  the  front  which  led  up  to  the  war  between 
the  States.  "  The  inauguration  of  Jackson  "  as  a  distin 
guished  author,  Professor  Woodrow  Wilson,  has  observed, 
"  brought  a  new  class  of  men  into  leadership,  and  marks 
the  beginning,  for  good  or  for  ill,  of  a  distinctly  American 
order  of  politics,  begotten  of  the  crude  forces  of  a  new 
nationality.  The  new  generation  which  asserted  itself  in 
Jackson  was  not  in  the  least  regardful  of  conservative  tra 
dition.  It  had  no  taint  of  antiquity  about  it.  It  was  dis 
tinctively  new,  and  buoyantly  expectant." 

Prior  to  the  assembling  of  the  Twenty-third  Congress, 
and  just  after  his  second  election,  Jackson,  in  pursuance  of 
his  declared  hostility  to  the  Bank  of  the  United  States,  — 
the  charter  of  which  was  to  expire  in  1836,  —  had  ordered 
the  removal  of  the  deposits,  amounting  to  something  like 
$10,000,000,  which  were  transferred  to  the  "pet"  banks 
as  they  were  called.  The  withdrawal  of  this  large  sum 
necessarily  compelled  the  Bank  to  curtail  its  loans,  in 
like  proportions,  and  caused  a  stringency,  almost  amount 
ing  to  a  panic,  in  the  money  market.  This  act  of  execu 
tive  usurpation,  as  many  considered  it,  alienated  from 
Jackson  the  support  of  seventeen  Democrats  in  the  House, 
besides  several  in  the  Senate,  who,  on  account  of  their 
peculiar  situation,  —  acting  neither  with  the  administration 
nor  the  Federal  opposition, — were  designated  the  "Awk 
ward  Squad."  Among  this  number  was  Wise,  whose  maiden 
effort  upon  the  floor  of  the  House  was  an  argument  in 


44  THE  LIFE   OF   HENKY   A.  WISE 

favor  of  the  restoration  of  the  deposits  and  of  a  national 
bank,  which  last  he  considered  as  the  best  agency  to  se 
cure  to  the  country  a  safe  and  uniform  currency.  During 
the  course  of  his  speech,  in  alluding  incidentally  to  John 
Randolph,  he  commented  upon  the  fact  that  his  death  had 
never  been  announced  to  the  House  of  Representatives. 
A  few  days  afterward,  Judge  Bouldin  of  Virginia,  who 
had  been  elected  as  Randolph's  successor,  rose  to  explain 
the  reasons  why  the  House  had  never  been  informed  of 
Mr.  Randolph's  death;  when  suddenly,  just  after  com 
mencing  his  remarks,  he  swooned,  fell,  and  expired  in  a 
few  minutes. 

Foremost,  at  least  in  its  far-reaching  effects,  among  the 
questions  that  were  forced  upon  the  attention  of  the  coun 
try  during  the  Twenty-second  and  Twenty-third  Congresses, 
was  that  of  the  presentation  of  abolition  petitions.  As  far 
back  as  the  year  1790,  a  petition  on  this  subject,  signed  by 
Benjamin  Franklin  among  others,  had  been  presented,  and 
in  response  thereto  it  had  been  resolved  "  That  Congress 
have  no  authority  to  interfere  in  the  emancipation  of 
slaves,  or  in  the  treatment  of  them  in  any  of  the  States." 
During  the  first  forty  years  of  the  government,  very  few 
antislavery  petitions  were  presented,  but  about  the  years 
1831-32  the  question  began  to  assume  a  serious  aspect, 
from  the  appearance  of  numerous  petitions  praying  for 
the  abolition  of  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia,  over 
which  it  was  claimed  Congress  had  entire  jurisdiction,  and 
by  the  time  of  the  assembling  of  the  Twenty-fourth  Con 
gress  in  December,  1835,  the  question  of  the  reception  and 
disposition  of  these  memorials  caused  wide  divisions  of 
opinion  and  aroused  acrimonious  controversies. 

It  was  in  the  discussion  of  this  question  that  old  John 
Quincy  Adams  was  to  employ  all  his  energy  of  mind  and 
character,  as  a  member  of  the  House  of  Representatives, 


DEBATES    OVER   ABOLITION    PETITIONS  45 

to  which  he  had  been  elected,  after  having  served  his  coun 
try  as  minister  at  foreign  courts,  as  Secretary  of  State,  and 
as  President.  On  January  10,  1832,  Adams  wrote  in  his 
diary :  "  Mr.  Lewis  came  to  have  some  conversation  with 
me  upon  the  subject  of  slavery  in  the  District  of  Colum 
bia.  .  .  .  He  said  he  wished  to  know  my  sentiments  upon 
slavery.  I  told  him  I  thought  they  were  not  materially 
different  from  his  own,  that  in  presenting  the  petition  I 
had  explained  the  wish  that  the  subject  might  not  be  dis 
cussed  in  the  House,  because  I  believed  a  discussion  would 
lead  to  ill-will,  to  heartburnings,  to  mutual  hatreds,  where 
the  first  of  all  wants  was  harmony,  and  without  accomplish 
ing  anything  else.  I  asked  what  he  should  think  of  the 
inhabitants  of  the  District  of  Columbia  if  they  should  pe 
tition  the  legislature  of  Pennsylvania  to  enact  a  law  to 
compel  the  citizens  of  that  State  to  bear  arms  in  defence  of 
their  country.  He  said  he  should  think  they  were  med 
dling  with  what  did  not  concern  them.  I  said  the  people 
of  the  District  might  say  the  same  of  citizens  of  Pennsyl 
vania  petitioning  for  abolition,  not  in  the  State  itself,  but 
in  the  District  of  Columbia." 

The  agitation  of  this  question  was  naturally  peculiarly) 
disturbing  to  the  people  of  the  Southern  States,  and, 
viewed  in  connection  with  other  events  of  the  period,  was 
calculated  to  irritate  and  alarm  them  in  a  high  degree. 
In  1831  William  Lloyd  Garrison  founded  the  Liberator, 
and  in  1833  the  American  Antislavery  Society  was  formed. 
The  people  of  the  Southern  States  awoke  to  a  realization 
of  the  fact  that  their  section  was  being  flooded  with  aboli 
tion  pamphlets  and  literature,  and  that  they  had  been 
slumbering  in  false  security. 

The  inhabitants  of  Virginia,  by  nature  conservative  and 
hard  to  arouse,  became  alarmingly  aware  of  the  fact,  by 
the  Nat  Turner  insurrection  which  broke  out  in  the  year 


46  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.   WISE 

1831.  Prior  to  1830,  a  large  proportion,  if  not  a  majority, 
of  the  abolition  societies  were  at  the  South,  and  as  late 
as  1827  there  were  eight  such  organizations  in  the  State 
of  Virginia,  besides  the  African  Colonization  Society. 
The  subject  of  gradual  emancipation  had  long  been 
thought  of  in  that  State,  and  received  a  large  share  of 
attention  in  the  legislature  during  the  session  of  1831-32. 
A  similar  sentiment  existed  about  the  same  period,  in  the 
States  of  Kentucky,  North  Carolina,  and  Tennessee.  In 
Virginia,  at  least,  the  opinions  of  her  foremost  public  men, 
in  the  earlier  days,  had  always  been  in  favor  of  gradual 
emancipation,  which  was  strengthened  by  the  fact  that  the 
institution  was  not  profitable  there,  as  it  was  in  the  cotton- 
growing  section.  They  had  never  regarded  slavery  as  "  a 
good,  a  positive  good,"  such  as  Calhoun  declared  it  to  be, 
but  looked  upon  it  as  an  inherited  wen,  grafted  upon  their 
civilization,  which  ought  to  be  removed  as  soon  as  prac 
ticable.  It  was  agitation  of  a  far  different  character, 
and  conducted  in  an  entirely  different  spirit,  by  people 
having  nothing  in  common  with  their  situation  and  sur 
roundings,  which  caused  a  revulsion  in  the  sentiments  of 
the  Virginia  people,  at  the  period  mentioned,  and  made 
peaceful  emancipation  thereafter  impossible. 

The  discussion  of  historical  "  might-have-beens "  is 
always  useless,  but  there  seems  no  good  reason  to  doubt 
that  had  not  the  fanatical  agitation  of  the  question  of  aboli 
tion  arisen  in  the  North  during  the  thirties,  the  four  States 
of  Virginia,  Kentucky,  Tennessee,  and  North  Carolina 
would  have  themselves  undertaken  to  do  away  with 
slavery  in  their  limits,  and  the  effect  of  such  action  upon 
their  part  would  have  been  inevitable  upon  the  States 
further  south.  Thus  the  consummation,  so  much  to  be 
wished,  could  have  been  accomplished  by  the  peaceful 
power  of  public  opinion,  and  not,  as  it  afterward  was,  by 
fire  and  sword. 


SPEECH   ON   THE   SLAVERY    PETITION  47 

On  the  16th  of  February,  1835,  a  petition  from  certain 
citizens  of  Rochester,  New  York,  praying  for  the  abolition 
of  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia  having  been  pre 
sented,  a  lively  discussion  ensued,  during  the  course  of 
which  Wise  arose  and  said :  — 

"  Mr.  Speaker,  although  I  have  my  feelings,  my  pas 
sions,  and  my  fixed  principles  and  determinations,  as  a 
Southern  man,  on  this  subject,  yet  I  hope  I  can  discuss  it 
without  excitement.  I  rise  not,  sir,  to  throw,  as  some 
others  have  thrown,  a  firebrand  amongst  us.  I  rise 
simply  to  state  to  my  constituents  and  the  country  at 
large,  the  true  state  of  feeling  and  of  the  case  as  it  exists 
here,  in  the  North  and  in  the  South.  I  trust  I  am  well 
assured  that  the  representatives  on  this  floor  from  the 
North  do  not  wish  or  design  to  interfere  with  our  rights. 
That  they  merely  feel  bound  in  their  representative  duty 
to  present  these  memorials,  so  dangerous  in  their  tendency 
and  incendiary  in  their  character,  from  a  respect  to  a/ew,- 
a  very  few  only,  of  their  constituents  comparatively,  and 
that  they  do  not  act  from  their  own  impulses.  Sir,  on 
this  delicate  and  vitally  important  subject,  the  moderate, 
considerate,  and  patriotic  men  of  the  South,  as  well  as  of 
the  North,  have  enemies  to  contend  with.  In  the  North 
we  have  a  few  misguided  fanatics,  whose  zeal  prompts 
them  to  rush  blindly  into  the  most  absurd  extremes,  and 
in  the  South  —  I  am  sorry  to  say  it — there  are  not  wanting 
those  who  seize  upon  every  pretext  to  inflame  the  public 
mind  on  the  subject  of  slavery.  In  this  delicate  situation, 
what  should  be  the  course  of  the  friends  of  the  country 
and  our  institutions  ?  Why,  sir,  the  friends  of  good  order, 
of  the  Constitution,  and  of  the  existence  of  this  republic,  in 
this  House,  or  out  of  it,  in  the  North,  or  in  the  South, 
must  use  their  influence  to  moderate  and  quench  these  - 
spirits  of  both  extremes  of  fanaticism  and  disorganization. 


48  THE  LIFE   OF   HENKY   A.   WISE 

"  When  memorials  of  the  character  of  this  now  asked  to 
be  printed  are  presented,  it  is  respectful  enough,  I  should 
think,  to  the  memorialists,  to  receive  them ;  if  printed,  they 
will  be  circulated  throughout  the  country,  to  fan  the  flame 
of  the  zealots  on  one  side,  and  to  serve  as  food  for  the 
disorganizers  on  the  other.  We,  who  would  be  safe  and 
secure  in  the  blessings  we  now  enjoy,  will,  therefore, 
smother  these  memorials  on  their  first  presentation.  I  am 
willing,  sir,  to  treat  all  memorials,  no  matter  how  ex 
travagant  or  preposterous,  or  of  what  character,  with 
respect,  provided  they  are  from  a  respectable  body  of 
citizens,  decorous  and  not  dangerous  in  their  tendencies. 
But,  sir,  I  cannot  tolerate,  much  less  give  consequence  and 
e*clat  to,  memorials  and  petitions  which  strike  at  the  very 
foundations  of  the  social  compact  and  of  our  civil  institu 
tions.  I  will  not  hear  them  ;  I  desire  not  to  see  them,  and 
I  would  reject  them  at  once.  With  what  sort  of  respect  - 
I  put  it  to  the  gentleman  from  New  York  [Mr.  Fillmore] — 
would  he  treat  an  incendiary  who  should  respectfully  ask 
him  to  permit  him  to  apply  a  torch  to  his  dwelling? 
Would  he  regard  him  as  a  sober-minded  neighbor  or  mad 
man,  as  a  friend  or  fiend  ?  Sir,  I  was  sorry  to  hear  some 
of  the  remarks  from  the  gentleman  from  New  York.  He 
says  that  the  people  of  the  North  are  continually  shocked 
by  advertisements  of  slave  dealers  in  the  papers  of  the 
District.  I  am  sorry,  sir,  that  their  nerves  are  so  delicate, 
when  their  fathers  did  more  than  any  other  people  of  the 
Colonies  to  establish  slavery  amongst  us.  And  I  appeal 
to  Southern  gentlemen  for  the  truth  of  the  remarkable 
fact  that  the  immigrants  from  the  North  to  the  South, 
some  from  the  gentleman's  own  district,  perhaps,  are  as 
ready  to  become  masters  as  any  who  are  hereditary 
masters.  To  strengthen  their  nerves  and  change  their 
whole  principles  and  opinions  on  the  subject,  they  have 


SPEECH   ON   THE   SLAVERY   PETITION  49 

but  to  change  their  climes,  their  heavens.  And  if  they 
choose  to  remain  at  home,  they  may  cease  to  take  these 
odious  papers.  If  slavery  was  abolished  in  the  District,  I 
know  not  what  would  restrain  the  press  from  still  publish 
ing  advertisements.  And  if  the  papers  here  ceased  to 
publish  for  runaways  and  purchasers  of  slaves,  still  the 
gentleman  would  have  to  cease  taking  the  papers  of  the 
South,  or  to  silence  them,  too.  Sir,  slavery  is  interwoven 
with  our  very  political  existence,  is  guaranteed  by  our 
Constitution,  and  its  consequences  must  be  borne  with  by 
our  Northern  brethren,  as  resulting  from  our  system  of 
government;  and  they  cannot  attack  the  institution  of 
slavery  without  attacking  the  institutions  of  the  country, 
our  safety  and  welfare.  The  gentleman  says  he  will  ever 
respect  the  property  of  the  States,  but  he  claims  to  legis 
late  away  the  property  of  this  District.  Sir,  a  slave  is  as 
much  property  here  as  in  Virginia ;  property  by  the  law 
and  the  Constitution.  And,  in  addition  to  the  remark  of 
the  gentleman  from  Alabama  [Mr.  McKinley]  that  you 
surely  will  not  take  private  property  without  just  compen 
sation,  and  that  you  cannot  compensate  without  taking  in 
part  of  the  taxes  of  the  South  to  pay  for  slaves,  I  will 
repeat  the  idea,  that,  although  you  have  exclusive  jurisdic 
tion  over  this  '  ten  miles  square,'  yet  it  is  common  ground, 
for  the  good  of  the  whole,  and  for  the  use  of  the  whole 
people  of  every  State  in  the  Union.  And  I  would  ask  of 
the  gentleman,  if  he  can  come  upon  this  ground  with  his 
carriage  and  horses,  why  cannot  I  come  with  my  slaves  to 
remain  here,  to  live  here,  as  long  as  I  please  ?  Sir,  I  say 
it  not  in  passion,  but  calmly  and  dispassionately,  that 
Congress  has  no  right  to  abolish  slavery  even  here,  against 
the  consent  of  the  slaveholders,  who  are  not  represented ; 
and  I  warn  gentlemen,  that  the  South — I  speak  for  all 
as  strongly  as  one  man  can  speak  for  many,  for  millions  - 


50  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.    WISE 

that  the  South  will  fight  to  the  hilt  against  the  abolition 
of  slavery  in  this  District,  unless  the  inhabitants  owning 
slaves  themselves  petition  for  it,  as  they  would  against 
any  interference  with  the  right  of  slave  property  in  Vir 
ginia.  The  gentleman  calls  this  a  great  ^National  ques 
tion.'  I  protest,  sir,  against  it  being  so  considered.  The 
nation  has  nothing  to  do  with  slave  property.  It  is  simply 
a  delicate  question  of  private  individual  right,  wholly  and 
solely  under  the  control  of  the  States  where  slavery  exists. 
It  is  a  reserved  State  right,  with  which  the  General  Gov 
ernment  has  no  right  of  interference  even,  and  from  inter 
meddling  with  which  the  free  States  and  their  inhabitants 
should  scrupulously  abstain.  The  pseudo-philanthropists 
of  the  North  do  but  defeat  their  own  objects,  when  they 
rudely  attempt  to  touch  or  handle  a  subject  which  does 
not  immediately  concern  them ;  and  true  Christians  and 
philanthropists  will  always  find  their  principles  and  the 
cause  of  humanity  best  subserved  by  being  the  friends  of 
slaveholders,  instead  of  being  the  friends  of  slaves,  and  by 
cooperating  with  intelligent,  humane,  and  patriotic  slave 
owners  of  the  South,  by  ways  and  means  which  the  lights 
of  the  age  have  already  shown.  If  violence  or  intrusion 
upon  our  rights  be  persisted  in  and  pursued,  gentlemen 
will  find  Union  men  and  nullifiers  of  the  South  all  united  on 
the  subject,  —  ready  ripe  for  revolution,  if  the  worst  must 
come  to  the  worst !  I  hope,  sir,  that  this  House  will  not 
shock  the  South  more  by  the  printing  of  this  memorial  than 
the  constituents  of  the  gentleman  from  New  York  were 
ever  shocked  by  slave  advertisements,  and  that  it  and  all 
others  like  it  will  now,  and  for  all  time  to  come,  be 
smothered  and  suppressed." 

A  warm  discussion  followed,  participated  in  by  a  num 
ber  of  its  members,  which  caused  William  S.  Archer,  of 
Virginia,  to  remark  that  he  considered  it  almost  as  indis- 


AMENDING   PINCKNEY'S   RESOLUTIONS  51 

creet  in  gentlemen  from  the  South,  or  slaveholding  States, 
to  discuss  the  question,  as  it  was  for  the  representatives 
from  the  North  to  introduce  it ;  and  upon  his  motion  the 
whole  subject  was  laid  upon  the  table.  But  from  that 
time  until  December,  1844,  the  question  continued  a  thorn 
in  the  side  of  members  of  Congress,  and  arose  upon  in 
numerable  occasions.  February  8,  1838,  Henry  L.  Pinck- 
ney,  of  South  Carolina,  moved  a  set  of  resolutions  on  the 
subject,  viz.  (1)  That  all  the  petitions  should  be  referred  to 
a  select  committee ;  (2)  With  instructions  to  report  that 
Congress  could  not  constitutionally  interfere  with  slavery 
in  the  States ;  and  (3)  Ought  not  to  do  so  in  the  District 
of  Columbia.  These  resolutions  were  passed  by  the  House, 
and  shortly  after  an  additional  one  reported  by  the  com 
mittee,  viz.  that  thereafter  all  petitions  relating  in  any 
way  to  slavery,  or  its  abolition,  should  be  laid  on  the  table, 
without  action  and  without  being  printed,  or  referred. 
Prior  to  the  introduction  of  the  Pinckney  resolutions,  I 
when  a  motion  was  made  by  Jarvis,  of  Maine,  to  lay  a 
petition  on  the  table,  Wise  moved  as  an  amendment: 
"That  there  is  no  power  of  legislation  granted  by  the 
Constitution,  to  the  Congress  of  the  United  States,  to 
abolish  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia,  and  that  any 
attempt  by  Congress  to  legislate  upon  the  subject  of 
slavery  will  not  only  be  unauthorized,  but  dangerous  to 
the  union  of  the  States.  The  war,"  he  said,  "  is  now  com 
menced  between  evasive  and  direct  propositions  upon  this 
subject,  for  he  regarded  the  proposition  of  the  gentleman 
from  Maine  as  entirely  evasive.  .  .  .  He  wished  the 
whole  South  to  mark  it  if  the  previous  question  to  this 
amendment  should  be  put  to  them.  Let  them  toe  it  and 
let  the  South  be  undeceived,  or  let  the  South  be  guar 
anteed  in  her  rights."  And  in  the  discussion  of  Pinckney's 
resolutions,  he  again  objected  to  them,  as  not  meeting  the 


52  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

issue,  and  called  attention  to  the  fact  that  it  was  not  the 
people  of  the  South,  or  their  representatives,  who  intro 
duced  the  subject  in  Congress,  and  that  the  responsibility 
rested  upon  the  representatives  from  the  North  and  their 
constituents.  The  reception  of  the  petitions  and  legislat 
ing  upon  them,  he  regarded  as  yielding  the  point  in  issue, 
for  the  reason  that  if  the  House  could  legislate  against, 
they  could  likewise  legislate  in  favor  of  the  objects  peti 
tioned  for. 

In  a  letter  to  Governor  Tazewell  of  Virginia,  dated 
March  29,  1836,  to  be  laid  before  the  legislature,  Wise 
wrote  his  views  in  regard  to  the  abolition  petitions,  which 
we  reproduce  in  part :  "  The  problem  then  was  reduced  to 
this :  that  from  the  course  of  events  and  the  tendency  of 
causes,  good  policy  required  us  to  act  and  act  speedily 
whilst  it  was  yet  day ;  and  that  being  protected  by  the 
adventitious  state  of  political  parties,  we  had  everything 
to  gain  and  nothing  to  lose  by  acting  boldly,  provided  the 
representatives  of  the  slaveholding  States  were  united, 
j  and  true  to  themselves  and  their  constituents.  Accord- 
I  ingly,  my  course  was  taken  with  those  whom  I  considered 
the  true  advocates  of  slaveholding  rights,  of  Southern 
safety,  and  of  the  national  welfare,  in  resisting  the  recep 
tion,  not  the  hearing,  of  abolition  petitions.  This  resist 
ance  was  in  vindication  of  the  true  right  of  petition,  and 
founded  upon  the  true  construction  of  the  Constitution  in 
relation  to  the  power  in  Congress  of  abolishing  slavery. 
The  right  of  petition,  it  was  contended,  belonged  only  to 
petitioners  praying  to  a  government  having  the  power  of 
legislating  over  themselves,  in  cases  where  they  had  a 
direct  interest  themselves  in  the  subject  of  their  prayer 
for  legislation ;  where  they  petitioned  in  a  peaceable  man 
ner,  not  subversive  of  the  rights  of  the  legislative  body,  to 
whom  they  prayed;  for  no  object  hostile  to  the  public 


VIEWS   ON   ABOLITION   PETITIONS  53 

safety,  and  where  the  government  to  which  they  had  peti 
tioned  had  the  power  to  grant  their  prayers.  In  these 
eases  the  petitioners  were  not  citizens  of  the  District  of 
Columbia,  and  they  prayed  to  the  government  of  the  Dis 
trict  of  Columbia,  distinct  from  the  government  of  the 
United  States,  and  from  any,  or  either  of  the  State  govern 
ments.  It  was  contended  that  the  people  of  Maine  had  as 
much  right  to  petition  the  legislature  of  Virginia  to  abol 
ish  slavery  in  Virginia,  which  would  not  be  claimed  or 
conceded  by  any,  as  they  or  the  people  of  any  State  had  to 
petition  the  local  legislature  of  the  District  of  Columbia  to 
abolish  slavery  in  the  District.  That  the  right  to  petition 
carried  with  it  the  right  to  have  the  petition  considered 
and  granted,  if  reasonable  and  just,  and  it  would  be  un 
reasonable  and  unjust  that  petitions  of  people  whose  own 
rights  and  interests  could  not  be  affected,  either  for  good 
or  for  evil,  by  the  grant  of  their  prayers,  should  be  re 
ceived,  considered,  or  granted,  to  affect  the  rights  and 
interests  of  others,  which  might  be  injured,  or  destroyed, 
against  their  own  consent.  .  .  . 

"  It  was  further  contended,  that  to  refuse  to  receive  peti 
tions  after  hearing  their  contents  stated  or  read  was  not  a 
denial  in  any  sense  of  the  right  of  petition.  That  the  Con 
stitution  restrained  Congress  from  making  any  '  law  pro 
hibiting  the  right  of  the  people  peaceably  to  assemble  and 
to  petition  the  government  for  a  redress  of  grievances ' ; 
that  a  refusal  to  receive  these  petitions  was  the  making 
of  '  no  law ' ;  that  it  prohibited  not  the  right  '  to  assem 
ble  ' ;  that  it  prevented  not  and  hindered  not  the  right 
4  to  petition ' ;  or  even  the  right  to  have  the  petition 
heard;  that  these  petitions  for  abolition  were  not  for 
'  redress '  of  their  own  '  grievances,'  but  of  the  griev 
ances  of  others,  who  did  not  and  could  not  themselves 
petition  or  complain;  and  that  the  right  of  Congress, 


54  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY    A.  WISE 

as  a  legislative  body,  to  receive  or  reject  these  petitions, 
commenced  only  where  the  right  of  petition  ended.  That 
if  petitioners  had  the  absolute  right  to  have  their  peti 
tions  received,  by  the  same  course  of  reasoning  they 
had  the  right  absolutely  to  have  them  considered  and 
granted." 

In  the  light  of  the  present,  the  ground  on  which  Wise 
and  his  associates  based  their  course  of  action  was  clearly 
untenable,  as  "the  right  to  offer  a  petition  implies  the 
duty  of  Congress  to  receive  it " ;  but  in  either  case,  the 
Southern  members  pursued  a  short-sighted  policy  in  allow 
ing  Adams  and  the  abolitionists  to  assume  the  attitude  of 
champions  of  a  right  as  ancient  as  Magna  Charta.  Due 
credit,  however,  should  be  accorded  to  the  motives  of  the 
former,  which  were  doubtless  largely  controlled,  not  only 
by  the  desire  to  protect  their  property,  but  to  prevent  the 
agitation  of  a  subject  dangerous  to  the  welfare  and  safety 
of  the  Union.  But  from  the  vantage-ground  thus  gained 
the  abolitionists  enlisted  the  sympathies  of  thousands  of 
conservative  citizens,  who,  in  other  respects,  were  but 
little  inclined  to  regard  their  fanatical  agitation  of  the 
subject  of  slavery  with  any  degree  of  approval.  As  long 
as  the  right  to  petition  seemed  in  any  wise  abridged,  or 
denied,  the  antislavery  party  not  only  awakened  the 
sympathies  of  many  on  that  score,  but  were  also  constantly 
able  to  provoke  discussion  upon  the  abstract  question  of 
slavery ;  and  thus  through  its  existence  in  the  District  of 
Columbia,  were  furnished,  as  Adams  said,  with  a  "  fulcrum 
for  their  lever,"  so  much  so  that  he  declared  he  would  not 
abolish  slavery  there,  even  if  it  were  in  his  own  power  to 
do  so. 

Perhaps  no  figure  has  ever  stood  out  in  bolder  relief,  or 
occupied  a  position  more  striking  upon  the  floor  of  the 
House  of  Representatives,  than  that  of  old  John  Quincy 


JOHN   QUINCY   ADAMS  55 

Adams  during  the  period  of  these  debates.  He  came  to 
be,  as  has  been  remarked,  "  the  funnel "  through  which 
these  petitions  were  poured,  by  the  thousand,  into  Con 
gress,  and  dealt  hard  blows  upon  the  heads  of  his  political 
opponents,  who  joined  issue  with  him,  on  the  right  to 
present  these  memorials. 

Rarely  have  scenes  more  stormy  been  enacted  in  Con 
gress,  and  the  debates  from  first  to  last  were  marked  by 
great  acerbity. 

February  8, 1837,  Wise  wrote  in  a  letter  to  his  wife :  "  On\ 
Monday  we  were  all  called  up  from  the  committee  room 
to  witness  one  of  the  most  serious  and,  at  the  same  time, 
most  ludicrous  occurrences  I  ever  witnessed,  and  one 
which  has  not  ended  yet.  Mr.  Adams  rose  and  said  he 
had  a  paper  which  purported  to  be  signed  by  twenty-two 
slaves  and  asked  the  Speaker  if  that  came  within  the  reso 
lution  of  the  House  which  lays  all  abolition  memorials 
upon  the  table.  He  didn't  say  what  the  petition  prayed 
for.  The  members  took  it  for  granted  it  was  for  the  aboli 
tion  of  slavery  in  the  District  of  Columbia  and  several 
offered  resolutions  and  amendments  immediately,  some  to 
censure  and  others  to  reprimand,  and  some  even  threatened 
to  move  his  expulsion.  He  sat  and  enjoyed  the  scene  ex 
quisitely,  for  an  hour  or  so,  and  at  last  rose  and  said  that 
the  paper  would  be  found,  if  read,  to  pray  against  abolition 
and  for  his  expulsion  !  The  hoax  was  grand,  and  put  those 
who  offered  resolutions  in  a  grander  passion  still  —  then, 
sure  enough,  they  were  for  expelling  him.  The  subject 
occupied  Monday  and  Tuesday." 

The  contrast  between  Adams  and  his  political  antago-X 
nists,   Thomas   F.   Marshall,    Gilmer,   Dromgoole,   Wise, 
and  others,  was  in  many  respects  striking,  particularly 
between  him  and  Wise.     Adams  was  a  New  Englander, 
far  past  the  meridian  of  life,  whose  presence  and  mode  of 


56  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY    A.  WISE 

speech  were  not  those  of  an  orator,  but  he  was  thoroughly 
informed  on  public  questions,  and  his  words  attracted 
his  hearers  because  of  the  weight  his  statements  carried. 
Despite  the  fact  that  he  lacked  the  element  of  personal 
magnetism  to  attract  men  to  him,  and  the  support  of 
the  wealthier  classes  in  his  own  district,  he  was  never 
theless  able,  by  the  force  of  his  mind  and  character,  to 
command  the  foremost  position  in  the  halls  of  legislation. 
Possessed  of  vast  stores  of  information,  a  natural  fighter 
and  master  of  invective,  intensely  narrow,  notwithstanding 
his  learning  and  travel,  and  rarely  thinking  good  of  any 
one  politically  opposed  to  him,  he  stood  upon  the  floor 
of  the  House,  in  many  respects  the  incarnation  of  the 
cause  he  championed,  and  the  prophet  of  things  to  come. 
As  early  as  May,  1836,  he  declared  that,  should  the 
Southern  States  become  the  theatre  of  war,  the  govern 
ment  had  the  right,  by  virtue  of  its  war  powers,  to  abolish 
slavery. 

Wise,  the  young  "  Harry  Percy  of  the  House,"  barely 
twenty-seven  at  the  time  of  his  election  to  Congress, 
and  a  mere  boy  in  comparison,  also  foresaw  the  future 
strife ;  but  singularly  enough,  the  old,  and  not  the  young 
man  illustrated  best  the  drift  of  thought  of  the  epoch 
in  which  they  lived.  And  yet,  it  could  hardly  have 
been  different,  in  view  of  the  environment  of  each. 
Wise,  despite  his  youth  and  inexperience  with  public 
affairs,  had  won  a  place  in  Congress  second  only  to  that 
of  Mr.  Adams,  and  his  impassioned  eloquence,  his  frank, 
manly  nature  and  personal  magnetism  made  him  respected 
and  admired.  Unlike  Adams,  he  drew  men  to  him,  and 
there  was  that  in  his  genial  and  lovable  nature  which 
endeared  him  to  his  friends.  Both  were  alike  in  the 
bitterness  which  characterized  their  arguments  in  de 
bate,  in  their  turn  for  invective,  and  irritability  of  tern- 


REPEAL   OF    "THE   TWENTY-FIRST   RULE"  57 

per.  The  use  of  invective,  however,  did  not  sound 
strange  to  the  ears  of  a  generation  which  had  been  ac 
customed  to  hear  the  speeches  of  Tristram  Burgess  and 
John  Randolph. 

At  each  succeeding  session  of  Congress,  after  the  adop 
tion  of  the  Pinckney  resolutions  for  the  tabling  of  abolition 
petitions,  similar  rules  were  adopted  by  the  House,  such 
as  the  Patton  resolutions  in  1837,  and  those  of  Atherton 
the  year  following,  and  in  January,  1840,  the  one  of  like 
purport,  which  came  to  be  known  as  the  "twenty-first 
rule."  In  December,  1837,  while  Slade  of  Vermont  was 
discussing  the  reference  of  two  abolition  petitions  to  a 
select  committee,  he  was  interrupted  by  Dawson  of 
Georgia,  Rhett  of  South  Carolina,  and  other  members,  who 
called  him  to  order  and  moved  an  adjournment,  against 
which  the  Speaker  ruled;  and  Wise  arose  and  declared 
that,  "He  [Slade]  has  discussed  the  whole  abstract  sub 
ject  of  slavery  —  of  slavery  in  Virginia  —  of  slavery  in  my 
own  district,  and  I  now  ask  all  of  my  colleagues  to  retire 
with  me  from  this  hall."  A  scene  of  indescribable  con 
fusion  and  excitement  followed,  and  the  Southern  members 
finally  withdrew  from  the  House. 

At  another  time,  Wise  declared  that  if  the  discussion 
of  the  petitions  were  continued,  he  would  advocate  a  retro 
cession  of  the  District  of  Columbia,  which  the  abolitionists 
sought  to  control,  and  that  if  that  failed,  he  would  vote 
with  the  Western  members  to  move  the  seat  of  govern 
ment. 

The  exciting  debates  on  the  subject  of  abolition  peti 
tions  were  renewed  at  each  session  of  Congress,  until  the 
final  triumph  of  Adams  and  his  followers  in  December, 
1844,  when  the  twenty-first  rule  was  abolished.  When  N 
Adams  presented  a  petition  from  citizens  of  Haverhill, 
Massachusetts,  praying  for  the  dissolution  of  the  Union, 


58  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

some  of  the  Southern  members  advocated  his  expulsion, 
and  the  character  of  the  debate  grew  even  more  acri 
monious  than  ever.  Then  it  was  that  he  turned  fiercely 
upon  his  antagonists  and  charged  Wise,  who  had  declined 
to  vote  on  the  question  of  his  (Adams's)  expulsion,  with 
being  responsible  for  the  Graves-Cilley  duel. 

S.  G.  Goodrich  in  his  "  Recollections  "  quotes  a  spectator 
of  this  debate  as  saying:  "I  remember  one  day  to  have 
been  on  the  floor  of  the  House  when  he  [Adams]  attacked 
Mr.  Wise  with  great  personality  and  bitterness.  In  allu 
sion  to  the  Cilley  duel,  with  which  he  was  connected,  he 
spoke  of  him  as  coming  into  that  assembly,  'his  hands 
dripping  with  blood.'  There  was  a  terrible  jarring  tone 
in  his  voice,  which  gave  added  effect  to  the  denunciation. 
Every  person  present  seemed  to  be  thrilled  with  a  sort  of 
horror,  rather  toward  Mr.  Adams  than  the  object  of  his 
reproaches.  In  speaking  of  this  scene  to  me  afterward, 
an  eminent  member  of  Congress  said  that,  '  Mr.  Adams's 
greatest  delight  was  to  be  the  hero  of  a  row.  There  is  no 
doubt  that  the  rude  personal  passages,  which  often  occur 
in  the  House  of  Representatives,  derive  countenance  from 
Mr.  Adams's  example.' " 

An  amusing  remonstrance  to  the  abolition  petitions 
occurred  when  Wise  presented  a  petition  from  a  number 
of  men  and  women  of  Halifax  County,  Virginia,  praying 
Congress  to  furnish  husbands  at  public  expense  to  all 
female  petitioners  upon  subjects  relating  to  slavery,  thereby 
giving  a  direction  to  their  minds  calculated  to  make  them 
good  matrons  and  to  avert  the  evils  with  which  the  fanati 
cism  of  the  Eastern  States  threatened  the  people  of  the 
South. 

But  if  Adams  delighted  in  being  "  the  hero  of  a  row," 
it  must  be  confessed  that  in  that  particular  Wise  did  not 
altogether  differ  from  him;  and  his  fiery,  excitable  tern- 


ADAMS   AND   WISE  59 

per  and  disposition  to  run  into  extremes  too  often  marred 
and  destroyed  his  influence  for  good.  In  his  calmer  mo 
ments,  he  would  have  been  the  last  to  approve  many  of 
the  extravagant  declarations  into  which  his  intemperance 
of  feeling  and  speech  too  often  led  him.  He  was  not  un 
willing  to  acknowledge  his  faults,  however ;  and  in  a  letter 
to  an  author  who  proposed  writing  a  biographical  sketch 
of  him,  he  expressed  his  thanks  to  the  former,  for  not  pub 
lishing  a  letter  which  he  (Wise)  had  written,  containing 
unpleasant  allusions.  In  adverting  to  his  habit  of  intem 
perate  speaking,  he  wrote :  "  I  never  have  deliberately  and 
wantonly  wounded  a  fellow-being,  though  I  have  often 
done  so,  sometimes  from  a  sense  of  duty,  and  sometimes 
impetuously.  Even  if  I  were  inclined  to  4  lash '  any  one  for 
4  lashing's  sake,'  I  do  not  think  that  your  intended  volume 
would  be  the  proper  place  for  it.  I  do  not  prize  my  fame 
for  the  faculty  of  saying  severe  things  very  highly,  and  he 
who  is  gifted  with  the  power  and  constrained  by  the  neces 
sity  of  saying  harsh  things,  or  even  of  speaking  out  his 
mind  and  feelings  strongly,  however  honestly,  in  this 
world,  is  not  apt  to  be  blessed  with  mild  judgments  of 
men  himself." 

After  the  debate  over  the  Haverhill  petition,  previously 
alluded  to,  Arnold  of  Tennessee,  in  commenting  on  the 
spectacle  presented  by  the  House,  remarked  that  scenes 
had  been  enacted  during  the  previous  seven  years  which 
suggested  the  French  Revolution.  A  hearty  laugh  went 
the  round,  when  he  proceeded  to  address  some  good-na 
tured  remarks  to  Adams  and  Wise,  between  whom,  he  said, 
some  very  extraordinary  points  of  coincidence  existed,  and 
who  ought  to  make  up  and  meet  as  friends.  "Indeed," 
said  he,  "  they  seemed  made  for  each  other,  they  were  so 
nearly  alike  in  their  tempers  and  passions.  Both  were  of 
the  genuine  Federal  stock  —  both  were  opposed  to  limit- 


60  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

ing  the  veto  —  both  professed  to  be  opposed  to  abolition  — 
and  they  were,  pro  tempore  at  least,  both  supporters  of 
the  present  resolution.  Clearly,  then,  they  ought  to  shake 
hands.  They  were  both  ruling  spirits  of  disorganization 
and  confusion  in  this  House,  and  they  were,  in  this  respect, 
such  a  complete  match,  that  he  had  more  than  once  re 
marked  that  if  they  were  put  into  a  bag  together  and  well 
shaken,  he  did  not  know  which  would  fall  out  first." 

Wise's  attitude,  on  the  question  of  abolition  petitions, 
was  in  accordance  with  the  views  of  his  constituents,  and 
Thomas  R.  Joynes  of  Accomack,  in  a  letter  to  him  in  1837, 
had  written  as  follows :  — 

"  Your  course  on  the  abolition  question  meets,  I  believe, 
the  approbation  of  every  one  here  —  and  I  hope  you  will 
continue  to  act  in  such  manner  as  to  entitle  you  to  a  con 
tinuance  of  the  approbation  of  your  constituents.  I  have 
always  been  afraid  of  the  abolition  question,  as  one  which 
would  ultimately  lead  to  a  dissolution  of  the  Union  with 
all  its  deplorable  consequences.  The  subject  of  the  aboli 
tion  of  slavery  in  the  States  is  one  which  must  not  be  de 
lated  in  Congress,  let  the  consequences  be  what  they  may. 
I  am  very  much  afraid  that  '  President  making '  will  be 
suffered  to  enter  so  much  into  the  consideration  of  this 
subject  that  it  will  prevent  the  united  action  of  the  slave- 
holding  States  on  this  important  subject.  This  matter  is 
one  of  the  greatest  importance  and  one  which  requires  that 
every  step  should  be  taken  with  the  utmost  caution  and 
prudence.  We  are  much  pleased  at  the  prominent  posi 
tion  you  occupied  in  this  business."  This  may  be  regarded 
as  a  very  fair  expression  of  the  views  of  Virginians  at  that 
time,  as  also  the  following  toast  offered  at  a  public  dinner 
given  to  Wise  at  Williamsburg,  during  his  congressional 
career:  "Slavery  —  Whatever  differences  of  opinion  may 
exist  among  us  Virginians  upon  this  vexed  subject,  we  are 


SLAVERY  THE  BONE  OF  CONTENTION        61 

unanimous  on  one  point,  a  positive  determination  that  no 
one  shall  think  or  act  for  us." 

Upon  the  one  hand,  however,  Adams  and  the  abolitionists 
continued  the  agitation  of  the  question,  and  on  the  other, 
unfortunately,  the  Southern  Hotspurs  kept  up  the  "  agita 
tion  for  the  suppression  of  agitation."  From  the  outset 
the  latter  had  failed  to  observe  a  "masterly  inactivity," 
and  had  not  shown  themselves  possessed  of  the  ability  to 
"  let  alone."  In  December,  1843,  when  Adams  moved  to 
refer  an  abolition  petition  to  a  select  committee,  Wise 
arose  and  stated  that,  though  he  had  long  opposed  the 
reception  of  these  petitions,  the  war  which  had  been  com 
menced  was  likely  to  be  carried  on  unceasingly  against 
the  South,  and  that  thereafter  he  would  vote  for  the  com 
mittees,  that  the  designs  of  the  abolitionists  might  be  dis 
closed  and  the  Southern  people  informed  of  how  they 
stood  on  the  question.  Just  one  year  later,  and  after) 
Wise's  resignation  as  a  member  of  Congress,  Adams 
achieved  a  signal  triumph  in  securing  the  abolition  of 
the  twenty-first  rule,  against  which  he  had  waged  a  pro 
longed  warfare. 

When  a  candidate  for  governor  of  Virginia,  in  1855, 
Wise  declared  from  the  hustings:  "I  have  had  a  very 
severe  training  in  collision  with  the  acutest,  the  astutest, 
the  archest  enemy  of  Southern  slavery  that  ever  existed. 
I  mean  the  '  Old  Man  Eloquent,'  John  Quincy  Adams. 
I  must  have  been  a  dull  boy  indeed  if  I  had  not  learned 
my  lessons  thoroughly  on  that  subject.  And  let  me  tell 
you  that  again  and  again  I  had  reason  to  know  and  to 
feel  the  wisdom  and  sagacity  of  that  departed  man.  Again 
and  again,  in  the  lobby,  on  the  floor,  he  told  me  vauntingly 
that  the  pulpit  would  preach,  and  the  school  would  teach, 
and  the  press  would  print,  among  the  people  who  had  no 
tie  and  no  association  with  slavery,  until,  would  not  only 


62  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

be  reached  the  slave-trade  between  the  States,  the  slave^ 
trade  in  the  District  of  Columbia,  slavery  in  the  District, 
slavery  in  the  Territories,  but  slavery  in  the  States.  Again 
and  again  he  said  that  he  would  not  abolish  slavery  in  the 
District  of  Columbia  if  he  could ;  for  he  would  retain  it 
as  a  bone  of  contention,  —  a  fulcrum  of  the  lever  for  agita 
tion,  agitation,  agitation,  until  slavery  in  the  States  was 
shaken  from  its  base.  And  his  prophecies  have  been  ful 
filled —  fulfilled  far  faster  and  more  fearfully,  certainly, 
than  ever  he  anticipated,  before  he  died." 


CHAPTER  V 

ADVOCATES  BUILDING  OF  AN  IRONCLAD.  OPPOSES  VAN  BURENJS 
ELECTION.  A  REPORTER'S  DESCRIPTION  OF  WISE.  THE  EX 
PUNGING  RESOLUTIONS.  DEATH  OF  HIS  WIFE.  VIEWS  ON 
TEMPERANCE.  SARGENT  S.  PRENTISS 

DURING  his  first  session  in  Congress,  Wise  was  appointed 
a  member  of  the  committee  on  naval  affairs,  of  which  he 
became  chairman  later  on.  His  efforts  for  the  improve 
ment  of  the  condition  of  the  navy  were  untiring,  and  he 
zealously  advocated  an  increase  in  the  size  of  the  naval 
force  and  the  pay  of  officers  and  men,  the  establishment  of 
a  naval  academy,  the  revision  of  the  code  of  naval  signals, 
and  a  variety  of  matter,  designed  to  promote  the  efficiency 
of  the  service. 

On  the  8th  of  April,  1842,  Wise  addressed  the  House  on 
the  need  of  proper  coast  and  harbor  defences,  and  reported 
a  bill  for  the  construction  of  an  iron-clad  vessel,  with  sub 
merged  propellers.  According  to  the  report  of  his  speech 
contained  in  the  Globe, :  "  She  was  to  be  constructed  of 
sheet  iron  plates  and  riveted  together  in  such  a  manner  as 
to  be  impregnable  to  either  the  Paixhans  or  round  shot. 
Indeed,  the  experiments  of  the  board  of  officers  had  demon 
strated  that  the  plates,  put  together  in  the  manner  intended 
for  the  ship,  resisted  sixty-four  pound  shot,  fired  at  a  dis 
tance  of  thirty  feet.  She  would  also  have  all  the  light 
ness  and  buoyancy  of  wooden  ships  and  a  velocity  equal  to 
that  of  any  other  steam  vessel  either  for  escape  or  attack. 

63 


64  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

These  were  not  her  only  merits  ;  all  her  machinery  would 
be  below  water  and  out  of  the  reach  of  an  enemy's  shot. 
Her  means  of  annoyance  would  be  a  shot  invented  by 
this  same  Mr.  Stevens,  of  which  the  government  had  been 
in  possession  these  twenty  years,  and  which  was  as  much 
superior  to  the  Paixhans  shot,  as  that  was  superior  to  all 
others ;  a  shot  that  would  explode  immediately  on  strik 
ing  the  object,  that  had  no  fuse,  and  was  perfectly  safe  in 
every  respect.  He  would  mention  one  fact  to  show  its 
great  superiority.  Out  of  twenty  of  these  shot  that  had 
been  kept  on  hand  for  ten  years,  nineteen  of  them  ex 
ploded  on  striking  the  object  fired  at.  The  whole  ship 
with  her  armament  and  means  of  propulsion  came  from 
one  of  the  ablest  engineers  of  the  country.  He  proposed 
a  new  plan  of  propelling  vessels,  similar  to  that  of  Mr. 
Ericsson's  —  and,  by  the  bye,  Ericsson's  plan  was  his  —  by 
which  the  wheel  would  be  below  the  water,  and  out  of  the 
way  of  the  enemy's  shot  as  well  as  the  roughness  of  the 
sea."  Mr.  Wise  concluded  by  saying  that  "everything 
relating  to  the  ship  had  been  proved  by  actual  experiment, 
and  that  it  was  the  best  mode  of  defending  our  coasts 
and  harbors,  now  eminently  threatened  by  the  English 
power." 

The  bill  passed  by  a  vote  of  129  to  31,  and  a  contract 
was  entered  into  with  Robert  L.  Stevens,  brother  of  Ed 
ward  A.,  the  inventor  of  the  plan,  for  the  construction  of 
the  vessel,  which  he  shortly  commenced  at  the  dry  dock 
excavated  by  him  in  Hoboken.  Owing  to  the  various 
improvements  in  cannon  about  this  time,  which  enabled 
them  to  throw  round  shot  that  would  pierce  armor  plate, 
repeated  interruptions  and  delays  ensued  in  the  building 
of  the  vessel,  which  lay  in  the  basin  at  Hoboken  and  was 
never  launched.  This  is  claimed  by  Stevens's  biographer 
to  have  been  the  first  ironclad  ever  attempted,  and  pre- 


EFFORTS   IN   BEHALF    OF    THE    NAVY  65 

cedes  by  more    than   ten  years   the  vessels  used  by  the 
French  at  Kinburn  in  1854. 

It  was  before  the  naval  committee  over  which  Wise 
presided,  that  Morse  exhibited  his  battery  and  wire,  to 
demonstrate  his  discovery,  and  Commodore  James  Barron, 
after  his  return  from  exile  at  Copenhagen,  urged  the 
adoption  of  his  invention  of  an  ironclad,  consisting  of  an 
"impregnable  steam  propeller,  armed  with  a  pyramidal 
beak  on  the  water-line.  From  stem  to  stern,  from  side  to 
side  above  water  would  be  a  terrapin  back,  at  a  very  acute 
angle  of  incidence  to  a  shot  fired  from  a  ship's  deck." 
This  plan  of  construction  was  thought  impracticable,  and 
Barron  could  never  induce  Congress  to  adopt  it.  He  pre 
sented  Wise  with  his  model  of  the  Catapulta,  and  upon 
the  breaking  out  of  the  Civil  War  in  1861,  the  latter  wrote 
to  General  Robert  E.  Lee,  urging  the  construction  by  the 
Southern  Confederacy  of  a  floating  battery  after  this 
design. 

Throughout  his  career  in  Congress  Wise  continued  his 
efforts  for  the  improvement  of  the  navy,  and  in  1841,  upon 
the  retirement  of  President  Tyler's  cabinet,  was  tendered 
by  him,  the  position  of  Secretary  of  the  Navy,  which,  how 
ever,  he  declined,  preferring  to  retain  his  seat  on  the  floor 
of  the  House  of  Representatives. 

In  the  spring  of  1835,  Wise  was  a  candidate  for  re 
election,  in  opposition  to  his  former  rival,  Mr.  Coke ; 
but  during  the  canvass  the  latter  withdrew,  and  there 
after  supported  Wise.  Although  the  district  had  pre 
viously  indorsed  the  Jackson  administration,  to  which 
Wise  at  the  time  of  his  second  candidacy  was  opposed, 
yet  he  was  returned  by  a  handsome  vote,  and  reflected  ,i 
successively  in  1837-39-41  and  43.  / 

Throughout  the  remainder  of  Jackson's  administration, 
Wise  earnestly  opposed  the  executive  control  of  the  public 


66  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.   WISE 

moneys  and  the  "  pet  bank  "  system,  and  waged  a  contin 
ual  warfare  on  the  abuses  connected  with  the  public 
^-finances.  He  was  the  author  of  the  resolution  for  the 
.appointment  of  a  select  committee  to  inquire  into  the  mode 
of  selecting  the  banks  of  deposit,  the  contracts  with  the 
treasury,  and  the  relations  between  the  notorious  Reuben 
M.  Whitney  and  that  department.  But  the  power  of  the 
Jackson  party  in  control  effectually  blocked  the  way  to 
success  in  any  of  these  measures,  and  General  Jackson 
was  able  to  nominate  his  successor  for  the  presidency  in 
1836.  The  national  Republicans  put  forward  Harrison 
and  Granger,  as  their  candidates,  in  that  year,  and  the 
Jackson  Democrats,  Van  Buren  and  Johnson,  while  a  third 
party  was  formed  by  those  who  had  become  alienated  from 
Jackson,  by  the  questions  of  nullification,  the  removal  of 
the  deposits,  the  expunging  of  the  resolutions  of  censure, 
the  sub-treasury,  etc.,  and  that  third  party  selected  as  its 
standard  bearers  Hugh  Lawson  White  of  Tennessee  and 
John  Tyler  of  Virginia.  This  latter  ticket  was  supported 
by  the  disaffected  wing  of  the  Democracy,  among  whom 
were  Calhoun,  McDufne,  Poindexter,  Wise,  and  others, 
who  distrusted  Van  Buren  on  the  subjects  of  abolition  and 
the  annexation  of  Texas.  The  power  of  the  dominant 
party  and  its  compact  organization  caused  the  election  of 
Van  Buren,  whose  administration  witnessed  the  culmina 
tion  of  the  financial  panic  which  had  long  been  brewing. 
Throughout  Van  Buren's  term,  Wise  continued  his  advo 
cacy  of  a  revenue  tariff  and  his  opposition  to  the  sub- 
treasury,  believing  a  United  States  Bank,  the  best  means  of 
furnishing  a  safe  and  uniform  currency,  the  great  need  of 
the  country,  and  made  unceasing  protest  against  the  recep 
tion  and  reference  of  abolition  petitions  and  distribution 
of  the  proceeds  of  the  sale  of  public  lands  among  the 
States.  His  speeches  on  the  floor  of  Congress  were 


A  REPORTER'S  DESCRIPTION  OP  WISE  67 

scathing  invectives  against  the  abuses  of  the  Treasury  De 
partment,  and  he  was  chosen  one  of  the  committee  to  investi 
gate  the  S wartwout  defalcations.  John  Quincy  Adams,  who 
rarely  had  anything  good  to  say  of  a  political  opponent, 
and  especially  of  Wise,  wrote  in  his  diary  December  21, 
1838,  in  alluding  to  a  six  hours'  speech  of  the  latter:  "  The 
speech  was  the  most  powerful  and  unanswerable  attack 
upon  the  administration,  and  especially  upon  the  Secretary 
of  the  Treasury,  that  has  ever  been  made  in  Congress; 
and  as  he  passed  from  charge  to  charge,  he  supported 
every  imputation  by  the  documents  from  the  Treasury 
Department  itself." 

Although  but  thirty  years  of  age,  Wise  had  won  a] 
reputation  among  the  foremost  members  of  Congress, 
and  he  had  come  to  be  regarded  as  one  of  the  leading 
political  orators  of  the  country.  A  reporter,  in  an  article 
entitled  "  Glances  at  Congress,"  thus  describes  his  per 
sonal  appearance  and  manner  of  speaking :  "  He  is  pale 
and  thin,  about  thirty  years  of  age,  perhaps  not  so  much. 
He  dresses  like  an  old  man,  though  his  general  appearance 
is  very  youthful.  He  is  very  slovenly  in  his  apparel,  his 
coat  hanging  like  a  miller's  bag  on  his  shoulders.  His 
face  I  said  is  pale,  and  his  white  cravat  adds  to  its 
appearance  of  livid  pallor ;  but  he  has  a  dark  and  brilliant 
eye,  a  powerful  feature  in  Mr.  Wise,  which  seems  some 
times  to  flash  almost  unearthly  rays  of  light  over  his 
whole  countenance.  His  forehead  is  projecting  and  mas 
sive,  and  his  mouth  large,  but  firmly  set.  Without  being 
handsome,  his  face  has  a  general  pleasing  character.  .  .  . 
To  see  him  sauntering  about  the  hall,  with  his  long  Indian 
strides,  you  would  at  once  be  tempted  to  ask  who  he  was ; 
to  hear  him  speak  your  attention  would  be  riveted  upon 
him.  You  no  longer  see  the  loose  garment  on  the  ungainly 
figure,  the  outr£  neckerchief  vanishes,  and  your  eyes  are 


68  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

fixed  on  the  excited  and  earnest  orator.  All  his  prominent 
characteristics  are  brought  out  with  great  rapidity  —  firm 
ness,  impetuosity,  a  disdain  for  hone}red  words,  fierce  sar 
casm  and  invective,  all  gather  into  a  hurricane  and  startle 
the  drowsy  members  from  the  lounges  and  wake  up  those 
victims  of  dull  hours,  the  reporters.  .  .  .  Mr.  Wise  may 
not  always  say  anything  remarkable  or  striking,  but  there 
is  an  intensity  about  his  manner  that  fastens  on  the  atten 
tion  and  clutches  it  until  he  has  finished.  He  is  remarka 
bly  quick  in  arriving  at  conclusions,  and  generally,  too, 
in  a  way  that  would  not  have  been  struck  upon  by  any 
one  else.  He  is  very  independent  in  his  disposition,  fear 
less,  and,  to  use  a  common  expression,  above  board.  .  .  . 
He  has  undoubtedly  very  high  talents,  and  I  have  heard 
him,  upon  more  than  one  occasion,  soar  into  the  regions 
of  commanding  eloquence.  His  forte  lies  in  invective ; 
then  he  becomes,  to  those  whose  party  sympathies  follow 
his  own  excited  train  of  feeling,  thrilling ;  his  pale  and 
excited  face,  his  firm  and  compact  head  thrown  back, 
his  small  bony  hand  clenched  in  the  air,  or  with  the 
forefinger  quivering  there,  his  eyes  brilliant  and  fixed, 
his  voice  high  yet  sonorous,  impress  a  picture  too  vivid 
to  be  easily  erased  from  the  mind.  A  stranger,  a  few 
days  ago,  of  his  own  party,  on  coming  into  the  hall  for 
the  first  time,  at  such  a  moment,  compared  his  appearance 
to  that  of  a  corpse  galvanized!  Mr.  Wise,  as  is  well 
known,  is  a  prominent  member  of  the  opposition.  He 
cannot  be  ranked  as  a  leader;  certain  it  is,  however,  he 
is  not  led.  He  is  much  beloved  by  those  who  know 
him  in  private  life,  being  jovial,  free-hearted,  and  full  of 
hilarity." 

On  the  17th  of  January,  1837,  Wise  wrote  to  his  wife 
as  follows,  describing  the  celebrated  "  expunging "  scene 
which  he  had  witnessed  in  the  Senate  Chamber :  — 


THE   "  EXPUNGING   RESOLUTIONS  "  69 

"  *  •  •  Last  night  I  witnessed  one  of  the  most  distressing 
scenes  I  ever  beheld,  or  ever  will  voluntarily  behold  again. 
The  Senate  sat  late.  I  went  up  to  the  Capitol  after  I  got 
my  supper.  I  found  Strange,  the  senator  in  Mangum's 
place,  addressing  the  Senate  on  the  resolution  to  expunge. 
He  was  weak  and  disgusting.  Ewing  of  Ohio  followed 
him  in  a  strong  and  manly  speech.  After  Ewing,  Mr. 
Webster  rose  and  stated  that,  if  there  was  a  constitutional 
provision  allowing  them  to  do  so,  he  and  his  colleague 
(Mr.  Davis)  would  file  their  protest  on  the  journal.  But 
there  was  no  such  provision,  and  if  there  was,  he  knew 
that  it  would  not  avail  them  if  the  journal  could  be 
expunged.  He  then,  in  the  only  way  left  them,  read 
one  of  the  most  able,  conclusive,  and  eloquent  papers  I 
ever  listened  to,  with  deep  pathos  and  solemnity.  He  said 
if  he  and  his  colleagues  were  not  compelled  to  regard  the 
act  as  a  ruthless  violation  of  a  sacred  instrument,  they 
would  look  upon  it  as  but  little  elevated  above  a  con 
temptible  farce.  He  said  they  had  '  collected '  themselves 
to  witness  it,  etc.,  etc.,  etc.,  said  it  was  dictated  by  the 
executive  to  do  homage  and  penance  to  the  Press  through 
State  legislatures,  made  a  beautiful  allusion  to  Massa 
chusetts,  proud  she  was  unconquered,  whose  soil  was 
mired  with  the  best  blood  of  the  Revolution.  I  never 
heard  anything  better  as  it  was  delivered.  I  looked  at 
Rives  and  thought  of  Virginia  and  wept.  Webster  fin 
ished  ;  the  hour  had  come  —  a  blank  only  was  to  be  filled. 
Benton  rose  and  named  the  day  —  the  16th  of  January, 
1837  —  that  date  was  entered.  He  called  for  a  division 
of  preamble  and  resolution.  It  was  entire,  it  could  not  be 
divided.  It  had  to  be  passed  entire,  all  had  to  be  swal 
lowed  at  once.  The  vote  was  put  and  stood  24  to  19  for 
the  desecration  of  a  record  which  the  Constitution  solemnly 
declared  should  be  kept  sacred  so  long  as  its  creature,  the 


70  THE  LIFE   OF   HENBY   A.  WISE 

Senate,  should  exist !  When  should  the  resolution  be 
carried  into  effect  ?  Benton  said,  '  At  once,  better  done 
at  once.'  He  seemed  to  fear  the  minds  of  men  would, 
upon  a  night's  reflection,  revolt  at  the  deed  and  recon 
sider  its  enactment.  '  Now  ? '  was  repeated.  4  Now.'  The 
clerk  went  for  the  book,  brought  it  in,  laid  it  open  —  he 
took  the  pen,  wrote  on  it  across  the  lines,  4  Expunged  by 
order  of  the  Senate,  January  18,  1837,'  and  then  took 
up  his  rule  to  draw  the  black  lines.  Patriotic  indignation 
could  brook  the  sacrilege  no  longer !  '  Hiss,  hiss,'  whizzed 
from  the  galleries,  and  groans  of  actual  agony  were  heard 
from  spirits  grieved  with  the  unutterable  oppression  of 
the  deed.  '  Ruffians  ! '  exclaimed  Benton.  '  Clear  the 
galleries.'  '  No,  sir,  arrest  the  offenders ! '  exclaimed  he 
again.  The  scene  required  a  victim  —  an  American  citizen 
was  ready — a  fit  victim.  He  was  seized,  dragged  before  the 
Senate,  the  act  imputed,  the  intention  imputed,  the  guilt 
presumed  without  proof  or  hearing,  and  he  was  without 
proof  or  hearing  condemned  and  punished  by  Benton  alone. 
4  Cannot  I  be  heard  ?  '  exclaimed  the  citizen.  4  Take  him 
out  of  the  House,'  exclaimed  the  president  pro  tern.  The 
cause :  '  I  am  a  Roman  citizen.'  4  Bind  him,  lictor.'  The 
Chair  announced  the  work  of  expunging  was  done.  Ben- 
ton  asked  if  it  was  done;  the  clerk  replied  it  was  done, 
and  the  fiend  god  of  the  scene  pronounced  it  '  Very  good.' 
The  Senate  adjourned,  and  I  looked  at  the  page  expunged 
as  I  would  at  the  corpse  of  a  murdered  being." 

During  the  year  1837,  Wise  met  with  a  severe  mis 
fortune,  in  the  destruction  by  fire  of  his  home  —  Edge 
Hill  —  in  Accomack,  which  was  followed  not  long  after, 
by  a  great  bereavement,  namely,  the  death  of  his  wife,  for 
whom  he  cherished  the  fondest  attachment.  While  absent 
in  Washington  on  February  1,  of  that  year,  his  dwelling 


DEATH   OF   HIS    WIFE  71 

and  papers  were  consumed ;  his  wife  and  children,  however, 
escaping  safely  from  the  house,  were  kindly  cared  for  by 
the  neighbors.  A  few  months  later,  the  house  occupied  by 
himself  and  family,  in  the  village  of  Drummondtown,  was 
set  on  fire  by  an  incendiary,  and  although  the  fire  was 
arrested  and  the  building  saved,  the  dread  and  nervous 
anxiety  inspired  in  the  mind  of  his  wife  caused  her  to  give 
birth  prematurely  to  a  child,  and  brought  on  an  illness  from 
which  she  died.  She  was  one  of  the  loveliest  of  women,  in 
both  person  and  character,  and  Wise  had  been  in  love  with 
her  from  early  boyhood.  From  her  household  duties,  she 
would  turn  to  her  favorite  poet  Burns,  whom  she  was 
fond  of  repeating ;  and  her  letters  prove  her  to  have  been 
a  highly  intelligent,  pious,  and  devoted  wife.  She  did  not  | 
share  her  husband's  political  ambition,  and  begged  him  to 
retire  from  public  life,  the  glamour  of  which  had  no  charms 
for  her.  Although  devoted  to  him,  she  knew  his  excitable 
temper,  and  dreaded  the  turmoil  of  politics  and  its  many  ; 
pitfalls,  to  one  of  his  fiery  nature ;  and  a  quiet,  domestic  I 
life  was  more  to  her  taste.  She  was,  moreover,  horrified 
at  the  practice  of  duelling,  then  in  vogue  in  the  South,  the 
dangers  of  which  his  public  position  constantly  exposed 
him.  In  one  of  her  letters  to  him,  not  long  before  her 
death,  she  had  written,  "  I  wish  that,  as  we  have  '  clomb 
the  hill  together,'  we  may  be  spared  to  a  good  old  age,  be 
found  in  the  way  of  righteousness,  and  sleep  together  at 
the  foot."  This  was  not  to  be,  however,  and  when  but 
twenty-eight  years  of  age  she  passed  away,  leaving  four 
children,  two  sons  and  two  daughters.  A  few  months  after 
her  death,  Wise  wrote  as  follows  to  a  friend  and  college 
mate,  Dr.  Robert  R.  Reed,  of  Washington,  Pennsylvania: 

"  Oh !  my  friend,  my  friend,  you  touched  the  chords  of 
a  heart  snapping  with  bitter,  bitter  sorrow  too  tenderly, 


72  THE   LIFE    OF   HENRY   A.   WISE 

too  affectionately  for  that  touch  to  have  been  forgotten. 
Your  letter  has  not  been  neglected  by  me.  I  would  have 
answered  it  ere  now,  but  since  that  harrowing  moment 
which  took  her  from  me,  I  have  been  more  dead  than 
alive.  I  could  not  answer  a  letter  which,  above  all  others, 
has  revived  so  many  recollections  to  make  my  tears  flow 
afresh.  Yes,  you  know  how  our  love  began,  —  were  wit 
ness  with  us  of  its  early  scenes,  —  you  know  its  purity  and 
its  power.  She  was  one  of  the  purest  and  brightest  spirits 
of  this  earth  —  she  was  unaffectedly  all  goodness,  sweetness, 
and  intelligence  —  she  was  my  wife  for  more  than  eight 
years,  bore  me  five  children,  and  daily,  hourly,  did  that 
love  such  as  you  knew  it  in  childhood,  increase  and  in 
crease  until  in  the  sight  of  God,  I  fear,  it  became  the  wor 
ship  of  idolatry.  Was  this  the  sin  for  which  she  was  taken 
from  me  ?  If  she  had  a  besetting  sin  it  was  this  —  that  she 
loved  me  too  well.  Is  such  a  sin  in  the  eyes  of  Him  who 
made  us  and  commanded  us  for  one  another?  Oh,  God, 
thou  hast  stricken  me  severely!  She  lived  as  she  died, 
and  she  died  in  the  Lord.  Oh!  that  I  may  die  in  the 
straight  path  to  her  in  heaven.  There  is  my  sin,  Robert. 
I  am  a  rebellious,  stubborn  sinner,  I  have  fully  experienced 
that  I  love  not  God  —  I  wish  to  go  to  Heaven,  not  to  meet 
Him  there  but  her.  She  was  the  star  of  my  life  and  she 
was  my  comfort,  I  have  known  no  other.  No,  I  never 
did.  Ambition  itself  was  never  so  strong  as  my  love  for 
her;  she  made  my  ambition  what  it  was  —  it  is  nothing 
now.  My  temples  have  often  throbbed  with  the  hot  con 
tests  of  the  world;  I  have  lived  an  age  since  I  saw  you. 
My  brow  has  burned  with  all  the  misery  of  public  life  — 
want  has  never  overtaken  me,  success  to  satisfy  ambition's 
self  has  ever  attended  my  footsteps  and  exceeded  all  my 
merits,  but  in  nothing  did  I  ever  find  happiness,  peace, 
pleasure,  comfort,  but  in  my  dear  devoted  wife,  and  she  is 


VIEWS   ON   TEMPERANCE  73 

taken  from  me !  Is  it  selfish  to  grieve  as  a  husband  thus 
bereaved  should  grieve  ?  There  is  some  joy  in  my  grief  — 
it  may  make  me  a  better  man,  I  hope  I  am  so;  I  believe 
intellectually  all,  I  have  no  faith  in  my  heart  at  all.  4 1 
would  believe,'  and  I  have  desire  strong  enough  for  Heaven 
now  to  pray.  '  Oh,  help  my  unbelief ! ' ' 

At  the  Congressional  election  of  1837,  Wise  was  returned 
without  opposition,  his  course  meeting  with  the  cordial 
approval  of  the  great  majority  of  his  constituents.  In 
that  and  the  following  year,  he  was  the  guest  of  citizens 
of  Norfolk,  Williamsburg,  Richmond,  and  other  places  in 
eastern  Virginia,  where  dinners  were  given  in  his  honor, 
he  being  everywhere  enthusiastically  greeted  by  the  ad 
mirers  of  his  course  in  Congress. 

Though  naturally  inclined  to  conviviality  he  was  re 
markably  abstemious  in  the  use  of  liquor,  for  a  man  in 
public  life  at  that  period,  and  his  intemperance  was  con 
fined  to  the  habit  of  chewing  tobacco,  to  which  he  was 
always  addicted.  After  his  return  from  Tennessee  in 
1830,  he  had  been  active  in  organizing  temperance  socie 
ties  on  the  eastern  shore.  In  May,  1837,  he  wrote  to  B. 
Hopper,  Esq.,  president  of  the  Maryland  State  Temperance 
Society,  in  answer  to  an  invitation  to  be  present  at  their 
convention,  in  which  letter  he  warmly  advocated  the  cause 
of  temperance,  and,  in  defining  his  views  on  the  subject, 
wrote :  "  I  am  but  thirty  years  old,  and  for  the  last  eight 
years  and  some  months  of  my  life,  I  have  not  tasted  a 
tablespoonful  of  ardent  spirits  nor  drunk  one  half  of  a 
gallon  of  wine.  I  have  paid  in  part  the  expenses  of  messes 
of  gentlemen,  who  at  the  boarding-houses  provide  them 
selves  with  wine  for  the  table,  and  for  the  customs  of 
hospitality  to  visitors ;  I  have  never  bought  nor  used 
ardent  spirits  at  all,  and  but  touched  wine  at  times  in 


74  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

observance  merely  of  the  forms  of  society  at  the  metropo 
lis.  ...  It  has  fortunately,  or  unfortunately,  I  know  not 
which,  fallen  to  my  lot  in  public  life  to  be  the  instrument 
of  exposing  abuses  in  public  affairs  and  offences  in  the 
men  who  conduct  them.  Such  as  I  think  worthy  of  ex 
posure,  I  shall  not  shrink  from  castigating  by  speaking  of 
them  in  my  place  and  out  of  my  place  at  will,  without  any 
regard  whatever  to  personal  consequence.  I  state  the  fact, 
then,  to  the  nation,  that  some  of  the  higher  executive  offi 
cers  at  Washington  are,  and  have  been,  notorious  drunk 
ards —  drunkards  in  my  sense  of  the  term  —  habitually 
affected  by  ardent  spirits,  drunk  at  least  once  a  week, 
impaired  in  constitution  by  the  use  of  strong  drink;  and 
I  further  state  that  I  have  often  heard  the  reason  assigned 
and  believe  it  was  a  valid  one,  for  the  House  of  Represen 
tatives  of  the  Congress  of  the  United  States  not  sitting  in 
the  evening  after  dinner,  when  the  public  business  required 
it,  that  many  of  the  members  were  so  much  in  the  habit  of 
intoxication,  that  they  were  not  only  unfit,  themselves,  for 
public  duty,  after  a  certain  hour  in  the  day,  but  were 
likely  to  prevent  others  from  discharging  their  duty  by 
interrupting  the  order  of  proceeding.  During  the  latter 
part  of  the  session  of  Congress,  when  the  two  houses  were 
compelled  to  sit  late,  members  too  drunk  for  the  decency  of 
a  tavern  bar-room  were  not  uncommon  sights  in  the  Senate 
Chamber  and  in  the  hall  of  the  House  of  Representatives, 
of  a  republic  whose  fathers  handed  down  to  it  the  hallowed 
and  immutable  truth, '  that  no  free  government  or  the  bless 
ing  of  liberty  can  be  preserved  to  any  people,  but  by  a 
firm  adherence  to  justice,  moderation,  temperance,  fru 
gality,  and  virtue ! '  These  are  facts,  sir,  which  in  my 
name,  if  you  choose,  you  may  bring  to  the  attention  of 
the  people  of  the  United  States.  I  am  utterly  opposed  to 
making  the  temperance  cause  a  political  engine  in  any 


VIEWS   ON   TEMPERANCE  75 

way  whatever,  but  if  the  friends  of  temperance  will  aid  in 
ridding  Congress  of  sots,  no  matter  to  what  political  party 
they  may  belong  —  for  they  are  a  disgrace  and  an  actual 
injury  to  any  party  —  they  will  be  subserving  their  own 
work  of  good  morals  and  do  the  country  some  service.  In 
deed,  the  facts  which  I  have  stated  apply  with  equal  force 
and  truth  to  both  Whigs  and  Tories,  in  about  the  exact 
ratio  of  their  numbers  in  the  list  of  public  men,  and  let  me 
not  be  misunderstood  as  reproaching  the  administration, 
except  so  far  as  high  and  responsible  executive  offices 
are  intrusted  to  intemperate  incumbents,  whose  habits  are 
known  by  the  boys  on  the  streets  of  Washington.  I  have 
been  a  candidate  three  times  for  the  suffrages  of  the  people 
in  the  oldest  district  of  4  Old  Virginia,'  proverbial  for 
honey  drams,  mint  juleps,  hail  storms,  slings,  dew  drops, 
and  every  description  of  nectared  drink,  and  have  never 
found  it  necessary,  or  requisite,  to  obtain  a  single  vote,  to 
resort  to  the  vulgar  graces  of  the  familiar  cup." 

Wise's  abstemious  habits  in  regard  to  drink  doubtless 
saved  him  from  running  into  the  excesses  then  common  at 
Washington  and  elsewhere,  as  he  was  by  nature  convivial 
and  socially  inclined.  His  means,  furthermore,  did  not 
admit  of  any  but  a  plain,  simple  life,  as  his  circumstances 
were  very  moderate,  the  pay  of  a  member  of  Congress  be 
ing  very  small,  and  he  had  to  meet  the  expenses  of  a  grow 
ing  family.  He  was,  however,  a  participant  in  many  of 
the  social  affairs  of  the  Capitol,  and  in  a  letter  giving 
his  reminiscences  of  Sargent  Prentiss,  describes  a  dinner 
given  to  the  latter  and  his  colleague  Word,  at  which  all 
the  notables  were  present ;  and  when,  in  the  midst  of  an 
after-dinner  speech  by  Webster,  a  member  of  Congress  in 
a  frenzy  of  excitement  seized  an  empty  champagne  bottle 
and  threw  it  at  the  head  of  the  "  godlike  Daniel,"  he  was 
prevented  from  striking  him  by  Wise  catching  his  arm. 


76  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

While  a  member  of  the  House,  Wise  boarded  at  Mrs. 
Queen's  near  the  Capitol,  or  at  one  of  the  Congressional 
messes,  as  was  the  custom  at  that  day  among  public  men. 
Among  his  most  intimate  friends  while  in  Congress  were 
Hugh  Lawson  White  and  Baillie  Peyton  of  Tennessee, 
Caleb  Gushing  of  Massachusetts  and  Sargent  S.  Prentiss 
of  Mississippi ;  and  the  brother,  as  well  as  biographer  of 
the  last  named,  has  happily  preserved  entire  in  his  memoir, 
Wise's  reminiscences  of  the  great  Mississippi  orator,  justly 
observing  that  such  "  an  effusion  of  true-hearted  friendship 
is  too  rare  a  gem  to  be  broken."  Still  another  biographer 
of  Prentiss,  Joseph  D.  Shields,  has  written  that  "  in  genius, 
in  intellectual  power,  in  fiery  eloquence,  in  lofty  scorn  of 
all  that  was  low  and  mean,  in  unflinching  valor,  in  un 
swerving  integrity,  and  in  tender-heartedness,  Prentiss  and 
Wise  were  not  unlike,  and  hence  the  sympathy  between 
them.  There  is  a  secret  intellectual  magnetism  which 
draws  kindred  spirits  toward  each  other,  and  so  it  was  in 
this  case ;  spirit  responded  to  spirit  at  first  sight,  without  a 
word." 

In  his  reminiscences  of  Prentiss,  Wise  relates  the  follow 
ing  among  other  episodes.  "  One  evening  he  and  a  friend 
of  his  were  invited  with  me  to  take  a  terrapin  supper  at 
Colonel  John  McCarty's  rooms.  We  spent  the  evening 
jovially,  and  at  a  moment  when  I  least  expected  any  mani 
festation  of  affection  from  Prentiss,  he  came  to  me  unob 
served  by  the  others,  took  a  small  stud  from  my 
shirt-bosom  —  an  urn  in  gold  enamel  (I  wonder  if  it  be 
among  his  relics)  —  and  put  in  its  place  a  pin  of  great  price, 
set  in  diamonds.  He  demanded  the  exchange  and  said  it 
was  for  something  he  had  heard  and  seen,  he  did  not  men 
tion  what  —  to  be  a  memorial.  I  tried  to  get  at  his  mean 
ing  but  he  would  never  tell  me.  I  always  took  it  to 
signify  his  approval  of  my  advice  to  bury  the  morbid  sen- 


SARGENT   S.    PRENTISS  77 

sibility  about  his  lameness,  and  to  brighten  his  existence 
by  taking  a  wife.  .  .  .  Soon  after  this  conversation  a  scene 
occurred  between  us  which  I  shall  never  forget.  It  was 
at  the  entrance  of  a  faro-bank ;  I  declined  to  accompany  him 
and  said :  '  That  is  one  of  your  high  rocks  and  it  has  no 
foothold.  Remember  the  fathers  and  the  comely  daugh 
ters,  too,  have  a  right  to  forbid  your  walking  there ;  it  is 
a  monstrous  height  of  extravagance,  from  which  you  even 
must  fall  and  be  crushed,  and  you  have  no  right  to  set 
such  an  example.'  He  said  he  would  go  alone,  went  on, 
and  I  followed  him  to  the  head  of  the  stairs  and  stopped 
him.  Looking  him  true  in  the  face,  I  said:  'You  are  rich 
in  everything.  You  have  a  mother  and  sisters  —  are  they 
provided  for  by  you  ?  '  He  turned  black  in  the  face  ;  the 
veins  in  his  temples  curdled ;  I  expected  he  would  strike 
me  with  his  cane.  It  was  the  only  moment  in  our  acquaint 
ance  when  I  had  reason  to  suppose  we  would  no  longer  be 
friends.  'Do  you  take  me  for  a  dog?'  said  he.  'Yes,' 
said  I,  'baser  than  a  dog  if  you  have  the  heart  to  give 
your  abundance  to  the  Cerberi  of  faro-bank  hells  instead  of 
giving  it  to  a  mother ! '  He  dropped  tears,  took  me  by 
the  arm,  went  in,  bet  a  few  moments,  and  came  out  with 
me  completely  subdued.  He  would,  ever  after  that,  per 
mit  me  to  chide  him  like  a  little  child.  He,  too,  had  done 
his  part  in  saving  me  from  sin.  Severe  conflicts  had 
passed  in  the  House  between  myself  and  one  of  his  oppo 
nents  (Mr.  Gholson).  I  drew  a  challenge,  and  offered  to 
put  it  in  the  hands  of  your  brother.  He  declined  alto 
gether  to  take  it,  unless  I  would  submit  implicitly  my 
honor  to  his  discretion.  I  did  so,  not  imagining  his  object 
in  obtaining  the  pledge  —  a  pledge  I  would  not  have  made 
but  for  the  conviction  that  in  all  such  cases  it  is  proper  to 
be  exacted  of  the  principal  by  one  called  on  to  act  as  a 
second.  As  soon  as  he  got  the  pledge,  he  took  the  chal- 


78  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

lenge,  slept  upon  it  a  night  and  brought  it  back  to  me, 
saying  that  he  had  reflected  upon  it  well,  and  concluded 
definitely  that  I  was  neither  called  upon,  nor  authorized  to 
send  a  challenge  at  all  in  the  case ;  that  he  had  witnessed 
the  whole  scene  and  I  was  bound  to  forbear  the  call,  upon 
every  consideration  of  necessity,  justice,  or  honor;  and 
that  no  one  could  fairly  bear  it  as  a  second.  In  case  I  was 
challenged  he  would  act,  but  not  otherwise.  On  another 
occasion,  at  my  request,  he  saved  a  young  friend  of  mine 
from  a  duel;  and  his  influence  in  such  matters  was  always 
potential  for  peace." 

Of  Wise's  religious  views,  we  have  thus  far  omitted  any 
mention.  Although  not  a  communicant  of  the  church,  his 
temperament  was  an  essentially  religious  one,  and  he  had 
been  from  early  manhood  a  believer  in  the  teachings  of  the 
Christian  faith.  When  a  motion  was  made  in  the  House 
of  Representatives,  on  the  assembling  of  that  body  in  1837, 
not  to  appoint  a  chaplain,  Wise  arose  and  said  :  "  This  was 
the  first  time  since  he  had  been  in  public  life  that  the 
propriety  of  appointing  a  man  of  God  had  been  questioned. 
Sir,  I  can  with  truth  say  that  I  am  among  the  vilest  sin 
ners  in  this  body ;  I  can  with  truth  say  that  I  have  more 
personal  reasons,  if  personal  reasons  were  to  govern  me, 
for  opposing  the  election  of  a  chaplain  than  any  other 
gentleman  on  this  floor ;  but,  sir,  there  is  no  consideration 
that  would  make  me,  a  representative  of  the  people  on  this 
floor,  a  member  of  a  House  of  Commons  in  a  representative 
republic,  divorce  a  republic  from  the  God  of  nations. 
Let  me  tell  those  who  are  now  desirous  of  divorcing  the 
State  from  the  Church,  that  they  cannot  divorce  a  nation 
from  the  God  of  heaven.  He  has  more  power  than  you 
have  to  dispense  with  nations  as  with  individuals;  and 
who  will  pretend  to  say  that  no  good  may  be  done  by 
making  our  acknowledgments  here,  as  it  were,  with  the 


RELIGIOUS   VIEWS  79 

uplifted  hands  of  a  nation,  that  there  is  a  good  Providence 
who  presides  over  the  destinies  of  nations.  If  there  be 
any  one  thing  more  opposed  than  another  to  the  existence 
of  a  republic,  it  is  infidelity.  Infidelity  was  the  hand 
maid  of  anarchy  in  France,  and  we  trusted  that  we  would 
not  encourage  it  by  departing  from  the  example  of  our 
forefathers." 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE    GRAVES-CILLEY    DUEL 

ON  the  twenty-fourth  day  of  February,  1838,  occurred 
a  duel  between  two  members  of  Congress,  which,  owing 
to  the  prominence  of  the  parties  engaged  and  the  sad 
termination  of  the  affair,  created  more  excitement,  per 
haps,  than  has  ever  been  aroused  in  consequence  of  a 
similar  catastrophe,  in  this  country,  with  the  single  excep 
tion  of  the  notable  meeting  between  Burr  and  Hamilton. 
Matthew  L.  Davis,  a  newspaper  correspondent  at  Washing 
ton,  wrote  a  letter  to  the  New  York  Courier  and  Enquirer, 
in  which  he  charged  that  it  was  in  his  power  to  convict  a 
member  of  the  House  of  Representatives,  whose  name  he 
did  not  give,  of  having  accepted  a  bribe.  A  motion  by 
|  Wise  to  investigate  the  charge  gave  rise  to  a  discussion 
on  the  floor  of  the  House,  in  the  course  of  which  Hon. 
Jonathan  Cilley,  a  prominent  member  of  the  Democratic 
side  and  representative  from  Maine,  urged  that  it  was  ill- 
advised  for  the  House  to  go  into  an  investigation  of  the 
matter  on  a  mere  newspaper  assertion,  and  alluded  in 
severe  terms  to  James  Watson  Webb,  the  editor  of  the 
paper.  The  result  was  a  communication  from  Mr.  Webb 
to  Cilley,  which  he  placed  in  the  hands  of  the  Hon.  Will 
iam  J.  Graves,  a  member  of  the  House  from  Kentucky. 
Mr.  Cilley  declined  to  receive  Webb's  note,  on  the  ground 
that  he  would  not  be  held  responsible  for  words  spoken  in 
his  representative  capacity,  as  a  member  of  Congress,  but 

80 


THE    GRAVES-CILLEY   DUEL  81 

at  the  same  time  stated  that  he  meant  no  disrespect  to 
Mr.  Graves  and  did  not  decline  on  account  of  any  per 
sonal  objection  to  Mr.  Webb  as  a  gentleman.  Graves  sub 
sequently  called  upon  Wise  to  consult  him  in  the  matter, 
and  was  informed  by  the  latter,  in  response  to  a  question 
from  Graves,  that  he  considered  Cilley's  answer  entirely 
satisfactory.  Graves,  however,  determined  that  it  was 
proper  to  secure  a  written  answer  from  Cilley,  and  accord 
ingly  addressed  him  a  note  calling  upon  him  to  put  in 
writing  what  he  had  previously  stated  in  the  interviews 
between  them.  Cilley  replied  by  saying  that  he  declined 
to  receive  Webb's  note  because  he  did  not  choose  to  be 
drawn  into  any  controvers}^  with  him,  and  went  on  to  state 
that  he  had  neither  affirmed  nor  denied  anything  in  regard 
to  his  character,  and  that  he  intended  by  the  refusal  no 
disrespect  to  him,  Mr.  Graves.  Graves  was  not  satisfied 
with  his  answer,  and  addressed  a  second  note  to  Cilley 
requesting  a  categorical  answer  as  to  whether  he  had 
declined  to  receive  Webb's  note  on  the  ground  of  any 
personal  exception  to  him  as  a  gentleman  or  man  of  honor. 
To  this  Cilley  replied  by  denying  Graves's  right  to  pro 
pound  the  question  contained  in  his  note.  Thereupon 
Graves,  who  considered  that  Mr.  Cilley  had  refused  in 
writing  a  satisfactory  answer  which  he  had  made  verbally, 
and  furthermore  that  he  had  impeached  the  honor  of  Mr. 
Webb,  for  whom  as  a  gentleman  Mr.  Graves  had  by  bear 
ing  his  note  undertaken  to  vouch,  sent  a  challenge  to 
Cilley,  which  the  latter  accepted.  Graves  had  never  been 
intimate  with  Wise,  and  when  he  first  called  upon  Wise  to 
bear  the  challenge,  Wise  declined,  but  yielded  when  Graves 
reminded  him  that  on  a  certain  occasion  he  (Graves)  had 
defended  him  when  he  was  attacked  on  the  floor  of  the 
House  during  his  absence.  The  preliminary  note  of  en 
quiry  which  was  so  framed  that  it  forced  a  duel,  and  the 


82  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

challenge  itself,  were  drafted  by  Henry  Clay,  an  intimate 
friend  of  Graves,  though  he  did  not  accompany  him  to  the 
field.  Wise,  with  the  assistance  of  John  J.  Crittenden, 
Senator,  and  Richard  H.  Menefee,  M.C.,  from  Kentucky, 
arranged  the  preliminaries,  as  seconds  to  Graves,  with 
George  W.  Jones,  M.C.,  from  Wisconsin,  for  Cilley,  associ 
ated  with  Messrs.  Bynum  of  North  Carolina  and  Duncan 
of  Illinois.  Rifles  were  named  as  the  weapons  with 
which  the  duel  was  to  be  fought,  at  a  distance  of  eighty 
yards,  to  which  Wise  objected,  as  unusual  and  necessarily 
fatal ;  but  Mr.  Clay,  upon  being  consulted,  remarked,  "  He 
[Graves]  is  a  Kentuckian  and  can  never  back  from  a  rifle." 
Various  pretexts  were  resorted  to  by  Wise,  designed  to 
delay  and  prevent  the  meeting  which  he  considered  un 
necessary,  as  the  affair  turned  upon  a  mere  punctilio,  and 
the  real  quarrel,  if  any,  was  between  Cilley  and  Webb. 
These,  however,  proved  futile,  and  on  the  afternoon  of 
February  24  the  parties  met  in  a  field  on  the  Benning's 
road,  near  Washington,  about  a  quarter  of  a  mile  north  of 
where  it  intersects  with  the  Marlboro  turnpike.  A  coin 
was  tossed  up  for  the  choice  of  positions,  which  Wise 
won,  and  Jones  gave  the  word.  Three  shots  were  fired 
on  each  side,  and  at  the  third  exchange  Cilley  fell  mortally 
wounded,  Graves's  bullet  having  passed  through  the  groin 
and  severed  the  femoral  artery. 

Wise  in  a  letter  concerning  the  duel,  written  to  Jones, 
Cilley's  second,  correcting  some  newspaper  accounts,  gives 
the  following  description  of  what  occurred  on  the  field, 
which,  though  written  years  afterward,  is  remarkably 
accurate  as  to  details  and  confirmed  by  contemporary 
reports,  as  well  as  by  General  Jones,  to  the  author  in 
person.  "  All  fairness  and  every  courtesy  were  observed. 
The  preliminaries  were  settled  without  a  jar ;  you  won  the 
word,  and  the  choice  of  position  fell  to  me.  You  fronted 


THE   GRAVES-CILLEY   DUEL  83 

me  half  way  the  line  of  fire,  held  yourself  in  position  to  be 
equally  heard,  and  delivered  the  word  aloud,  distinctly 
and  fairly,  as  prescribed.  My  eyes  were  turned  upon  Mr. 
Cilley  to  see  that  he  observed  the  terms  and  he  fired  first, 
nearly  about  the  count  '  one,'  Graves  last,  about  the 
word  *  two.'  Mr.  Cilley's  ball  struck  the  ground  between 
your  position  and  mine,  forty  steps  from  his  stand.  Graves 
missed  him  the  first  shot.  Mr.  Cilley  was  evidently  dis 
turbed  by  losing  his  shot  and  firing  too  quickly.  You  ran 
to  him,  and  something  passed  which  showed  Mr.  Cilley  was 
excited,  and  I  knew  would  make  no  concession  without 
another  fire.  Then  in  turn  Mr.  Graves  lost  his  shot  at  the 
second  exchange.  He  had  a  large  coarse  hand,  no  sense 
of  touch  fine  enough  for  a  hair-trigger,  and  no  experience 
with  firearms.  My  orders  to  him,  therefore,  were  to  hold 
his  rifle  cocked,  hair-trigger  set,  according  to  terms,  hori 
zontal  ;  at  the  word  4  fire '  to  push  his  gun  forward,  so  as 
to  bring  the  breech  firmly  to  his  shoulder,  and  then  level 
the  sight  on  the  vertical,  covering  his  antagonist's  person, 
and  to  fire  when  he  raised  as  high  as  the  hip  of  his  antag 
onist  ;  and  to  insure  deliberation  and  to  prevent  losing  his 
shot,  to  keep  his  finger  out  of  the  spanner  until  the  instant 
of  pulling  the  trigger.  This  he  did  the  first  time,  and  he 
fired  plenty  quick  enough.  But  before  the  second  shot, 
whilst  I  was  forty  yards  off  at  my  position,  Mr.  Menefee  (he 
and  Crittenden  stood  on  either  side  of  Graves,  as  Duncan 
and  Bynum  did  on  either  side  of  Cilley),  when  he  put  the 
rifle  in  Graves's  hands,  told  him  he  fired  too  slow  the  first 
time,  and  upon  Graves's  telling  him  of  my  orders,  he,  Mene 
fee,  objected  to  them  and  prevailed  on  him  to  put  his  finger 
in  the  spanner.  The  consequences  were  as  I  had  expected. 
At  the  word  '  fire,'  and  as  he  pushed  his  gun  forward,  and 
raised  the  breech  to  his  shoulder,  his  gun  was  discharged 
not  three  feet  from  his  toes.  With  his  gun  fixed  on  Cilley, 


84  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.   WISE 

seeing  no  smoke  and  feeling  no  recoil,  he  was  unconscious 
that  his  gun  was  fired,  and  raised  and  stood  pulling  at  his 
trigger,  when  he  received  Cilley's  fire  again  about  the 
count  'two.'  He  still  stood  pulling  at  his  trigger  until 
the  count  was  out.  Thinking  he  was  writhing  from  a 
wound,  I  ran  to  him  and  he  dropped  the  breech  of  his  rifle 
to  the  ground,  blew  in  the  muzzle  and  exclaimed,  '  Why, 
this  gun  is  discharged ! '  He  and  Menefee  at  once  ex 
plained  the  cause.  But  he  was  very  much  mystified  and 
nothing  could  have  prevented  him  from  demanding  an 
other  exchange  of  shots.  When  you  came  up,  as  you  did 
every  time  to  inquire  whether  Graves  was  satisfied,  you 
could  receive  but  one  answer,  not  without  some  dis 
claimer;  and  Graves's  awkwardness  caused  me  to  give  you 
the  notice  I  did,  so  much  denounced,  that  after  the  third 
fire  I  would  demand  a  shortening  of  the  distance.  By  the 
time  of  the  third  exchange  of  shots,  both  were  well  trained, 
were  deliberate,  and  Graves  strictly  obeyed  my  orders.  At 
the  count  'two,'  a  moment  before,  Mr.  Cilley  fired,  and 
about  an  instant  after  '  two '  Graves  fired,  and  made  the 
vertical  line  shot  just  above  the  hip.  Thus  ended  the 
fight.  Both  of  Cilley's  last  two  shots  were  very  fine ; 
they  passed  through  the  fence  logs  just  behind  Graves, 
one  at  the  elevation  of  the  breast,  the  other  a  space  below, 
perpendicular  to  the  upper,  and  at  the  elevation  of  the 
hip.  If  his  coat  had  been  unbuttoned,  both  balls  would 
have  perforated  its  lapels.  His  life  was  saved  by  his 
position.  The  wind  blew  steadily  fresh  obliquely  against 
Mr.  Cilley's  ball.  I  was  sure  the  aim  would  be  at  the 
centre  of  Graves's  body,  and  allowing  about  from  four  to 
six  inches  for  the  deflection  to  the  left  of  Cilley  and  right 
of  Graves,  I  selected  the  position  I  did,  though  disadvan 
tageous  in  other  respects." 

It  is  well-nigh  impossible  to  conceive  at  this  day  the 


THE   GRAVES-CILLEY   DUEL  85 

storm  of  indignation  that  broke  out,  at  news  of  the  duel 
and  its  fatal  result.  Cilley  was  not  only  a  prominent,  but 
a  popular,  man  in  his  section,  and  the  further  fact  that  the 
duel  was  fought  over  what  was  regarded  as  a  mere  punc 
tilio,  rather  than  a  real  cause  of  difference  between  the 
two  combatants,  tended  greatly  to  aggravate  the  popular 
odium  which  was  visited  upon  the  participants.  Although 
Henry  Clay  had  been  Graves's  chief  adviser,  and  Messrs. 
Crittenden  and  Menefee  had  acted  as  seconds  on  the  field 
with  Wise,  as  Messrs.  Bynum  and  Duncan  had  with  Jones 
as  Cilley's  seconds,  yet  Wise  and  Jones,  who  had  had  the 
arrangement  of  the  details,  were  looked  upon  as  the  main 
actors  in  that  capacity ;  and  the  former  especially,  as  the 
bearer  of  the  challenge,  which,  however,  he  had  neither 
written  nor  approved,  was  fiercely  assailed  in  the  press  at 
the  time  as  the  instigator  of  the  duel,  Colonel  Webb,  the 
editor  of  the  Courier  and  Enquirer,  also  coming  in  for  a 
full  share  of  censure,  as  being  the  proper  party  to  have 
fought  Cilley,  assuming  there  was  ground  for  a  difficulty. 

An  investigation  was  ordered  by  the  House  of  Repre 
sentatives  upon  the  announcement  of  the  duel,  two  days 
after  its  occurrence,  to  inquire  into  the  circumstances  of 
Mr.  Cilley's  death,  and  as  to  whether  there  had  been  any 
breach  of  the  privileges  of  the  House.  A  committee  of 
seven  members  was  appointed  who,  after  an  investiga 
tion,  declared  in  their  report :  "  It  is  a  breach  of  the 
highest  constitutional  privilege  of  the  House,  and  of  the 
most  sacred  rights  of  the  people  in  the  person  of  their 
representative,  to  demand  in  a  hostile  manner  an  explana 
tion  of  words  in  debate."  They  also  submitted  resolutions 
for  the  expulsion  of  Graves,  and  censure  of  Wise  and  Jones, 
but  after  a  long  debate  the  whole  subject  was  laid  on  the 
table.  Popular  feeling,  however,  found  vent  in  the  enact 
ment  by  Congress  of  the  Anti-duelling  Act  not  long  after* 


86  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

Cordial  political  relations  existed  at  the  time  between 
Clay  and  Wise,  and  the  friends  of  the  former  were  very 
anxious  lest  his  part  in  the  affair  should  be  disclosed  in 
the  public  prints,  and  mar  his  chances  for  the  presidency. 
Several  years  afterward  Wise  wrote :  "  Mr.  Clay's  friends 
particularly  were  very  anxious,  for  obvious  reasons,  not  to 
involve  his  name  in  the  affair.  Thus,  many  confidential 
facts  remained  unknown  on  both  sides.  Mr.  Clay  himself, 
it  is  true,  whilst  all  his  friends  were  trembling  lest  the 
part  he  took  in  it  should  be  disclosed,  boldly  came  to  me 
and  said :  4  Sir,  it  is  a  nine  days'  bubble  !  If  they  want  to 
know  what  I  did  in  the  matter,  tell  them  to  call  me  before 
them,  and  I  will  tell  them ! '  This  excited  my  admiration  at 
the  time,  and  was  effectual  to  prevent  me  from  unneces 
sarily  bringing  his  name  before  the  committee." 

For  several  years  succeeding  the  duel,  Wise  continued 
to  bear  the  opprobrium  visited  upon  him,  —  until  early  in 
1842,  during  the  debate  in  the  House  of  Representatives, 
upon  the  resolution  to  censure  John  Quincy  Adams,  which 
arose  from  the  presentation  by  the  latter  of  the  Haverhill 
petition.  Adams  attacked  Wise  with  great  bitterness  in 
regard  to  his  connection  with  the  duel,  and  declared  that 
he  had  come  into  that  hall  "  with  his  hands  dripping  with 
human  gore,  and  a  blotch  of  human  blood  upon  his  face," 
which  provoked  the  latter  into  replying  that  "  the  charge 
was  as  base  and  black  a  lie  as  the  traitor  was  base  and  black 
who  uttered  it."  Wise,  whose  relations  with  Clay  were  no 
longer  friendly,  published  the  circumstances  of  the  duel 
in  the  Madisonian  and  Intelligencer,  and  called  on  Clay  to 
declare  the  part  which  he  had  taken  in  it.  This  the  latter 
admitted,  in  a  letter  over  his  signature,  of  which  full  use 
was  made  by  the  New  England  Democratic  press  in  the 
ensuing  presidential  campaign,  and  it  was  instrumental  in 
defeating  him  for  that  office. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE  NOMINATION  OP  HARBISON  AND  TYLER.  "THE  UNION 
OF  THE  WHIGS  FOR  THE  SAKE  OF  THE  UNION."  CAM 
PAIGN  OF  1840.  MR.  TYLER'S  ADMINISTRATION.  ANNEX 
ATION  OF  TEXAS.  WISE  MADE  MINISTER  TO  BRAZIL. 
PARTING  ADVICE  TO  HIS  CONSTITUENTS.  SECOND  MARRIAGE 

IN  December,  1839,  the  national  convention  of  the  Whig\ 
party  assembled  at  Harricburg,  Pennsylvania.  There  had 
been  a  strange  alignment  and  readjustment  of  party  divi 
sions,  and  never  had  the  maxim  that  "politics  makes 
strange  bedfellows "  been  more  strikingly  illustrated. 
The  many  prominent  Democrats  who  had  become  alien 
ated  from  the  administrations  of  Jackson  and  Van  Buren 
on  various  issues  had  united  with  the  Nationals  in  oppo 
sition  to  Van  Buren,  under  the  Republican  name  of 
Whig.  Throughout  the  country,  numbers  of  leading 
Jackson  men  were  prominent  in  the  new  party  group, 
especially  in  the  South.  At  one  time,  the  supporters 
of  Hugh  Lawson  White  were  undecided  concerning  the 
course  they  should  pursue  in  the  election  of  1840, 
and  it  became  a  matter  of  general  interest  whether  he 
would  again  become  a  candidate,  or  would  leave  the  field 
open  for  Mr.  Clay,  who  from  all  appearances  was  the 
most  available  candidate  within  the  Whig  ranks.  Wise, 
who  was  on  intimate  terms  with  Judge  White,  was 
requested  by  mutual  friends  to  elicit  from  him  an  ex 
pression  of  his  views,  with  the  result  that  the  latter 

87 


88  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

announced  that  it  was  not  his  purpose  to  again  become 
a  candidate,  or  block  the  way  to  Mr.  Clay's  success ;  but 
at  the  same  time  he  urged  upon  Wise  the  necessity  of 
obtaining  from  Clay  certain  avowals  concerning  his  posi 
tion  upon  public  questions,  so  that  there  could  be  no 
misunderstanding,  and  that  the  Democratic  wing  of  the 
Whig  organization  might  not  be  placed  in  a  false  posi 
tion.  Wise,  in  a  letter  to  a  friend,  thus  describes  his 
personal  relations  with  Clay  and  the  result  of  the  inter 
view  upon  the  subject  suggested  by  Judge  White  :  "  I 
was  two  years  in  Congress,  from  1833  to  1835,  before  I 
would  be  introduced  even  to  Mr.  Clay.  But  opposition 
makes  'strange  bedfellows.'  After  making  his  acquaint 
ance,  his  many  high  points  attracted  me.  About  1838  I 
became  intimate  with  him,  and  personally  so  fond  of  the 
man,  that,  though  I  differed  from  him  on  almost  every 
political  issue  but  one,  —  the  Bank,  —  I  was  desirous  with 
others  to  enter  into  any  fair  compromise,  without  sacrifice 
of  principles,  to  support  him  for  the  presidency.  And  at 
the  time  of  my  interview  with  Judge  White,  there 
appeared  to  the  common  view  no  other  man  in  sight  for  a 
nomination  by  the  Whigs.  Judge  White  was  the  first  to 
warn  me  of  a  danger  of  his  nomination  being  defeated.  I 
laid  before  him  the  willingness  of  Judge  White  and  his 
friends  to  support  him,  but  the  necessity  which  they  felt 
of  some  fair  understanding  or  compromise  in  respect  to 
the  principles  on  which  his  administration  would  be  con 
ducted.  He  was  clear  and  perfectly  satisfactory  on  every 
cardinal  point  named  and  discussed  by  Judge  White. 
The  issue  of  Bank,  or  no  Bank,  he  agreed  ought  not  to 
be  involved  in  the  presidential  election,  but  it  ought  to 
be  postponed  and  submitted  after  the  election  to  what  he 
afterward  called  (in  his  Taylorsville  speech)  4the 
enlightened  judgment  of  the  people.'  Upon  distribution 


AN   INTERVIEW    WITH   CLAY  89 

he  referred  to  his  report  in  1832  as  evidence  that  he  never 
thought  of  applying  that  measure  except  when  there  was 
a  considerable  Surplus  in  the  Treasury  and  only  for  such 
limited  time  as  to  consume  any  surplus.  He  would  not, 
by  any  means,  resort  to  it  when  there  was  a  deficiency, 
and  a  debt,  and  when  the  Treasury  would  in  the  least  be 
embarrassed  by  it.  As  to  Internal  Improvements,  he  had 
never  thought  they  could  be  so  well  carried  on  by  the 
general  government  as  by  the  States  themselves  or  by 
private  companies.  His  only  object  at  first  had  long  been 
attained,  —  to  give  an  impulse  to  great  works  and  to 
State  enterprises.  The  latter  had  already  received  too 
great  an  impulse,  and  the  States  had  been  run  into  debt 
two  hundred  millions,  almost  beyond  the  means  of  redemp 
tion.  As  to  the  tariff,  he  was  emphatic  and  eloquent  in 
his  pledges  to  abide  by  the  Compromise  Act  of  1832.  It 
was  the  chief  pride  of  his  life  that  he  was  the  author  him 
self  of  that  great  measure  of  pacification.  He  would,  of 
course,  be  the  last  to  disturb  its  provisions,  and  would  be 
the  first  to  resist  any  infraction  of  its  good  faith.  And  as 
to  the  question  of  abolition  of  slavery  in  the  District 
of  Columbia  or  in  the  Territories,  or  of  the  slave-trade 
between  the  States,  he  hardly  supposed  that  he  could  make 
stronger  pledges  than  he  had  made.  True,  he  had 
admitted  the  naked  power  by  Congress,  and  he  had 
deemed  it  policy  to  keep  the  true  issues  apart  from  false 
issues  about  the  right  of  petition,  by  always  advocating 
the  reception  merely  of  abolition  petitions ;  but  he  was  a 
slaveholder  himself,  identified  with  the  South  in  that 
interest ;  and  so  inexpedient  and  bad  in  faith  did  he  deem 
the  exercise  of  the  power  of  abolition  by  Congress,  that  he 
would  justify  its  resistance  by  force  of  arms.  Thus,  then, 
practically  he  would  be  with  the  most  ultra  of  strict  construe- 
tionists,  though  he  might  fundamentally  differ  with  them 


90  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

as  to  the  principles  at  the  bottom  of  all  these  questions. 
These  pledges  and  compromises  he,  in  general,  actually 
embodied  afterward  in  a  speech  which  he  prepared  before 
hand  for  the  Taylorsville  dinner.  He  informed  me,  from 
his  notes,  of  its  leading  points.  Said  it  was  a  programme 
of  principles  upon  which,  if  nominated  and  elected,  he 
would  desire  to  see  the  government  administered."  Com 
paring  now  these  admissions  of  Mr.  Clay  and  similar 
admissions  of  other  Whigs  (formerly  National  Republi 
cans)  with  the  measures  and  tendencies  of  the  Democratic 
party  of  Van  Buren,  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  Whigs 
as  a  party  assumed  in  the  canvass  the  position  before  the 
public  as  the  States-rights  party  of  the  Union.  The  prin 
ciples  of  its  Democratic  wing  as  manifested  in  the  careers 
of  Tyler,  Wise,  Duff  Green,  Preston,  McLean,  Berrien, 
and  others  were  really  the  platform  on  which  they  solicited 
the  suffrages  of  the  country.  From  every  hustings  the 
Whigs  in  every  part  of  the  country  denounced  the  Demo 
crats  as  Federalists  and  latitudinarians. 

With  the  understanding  above  related,  the  friends  of 
Judge  White  adhered  to  the  fortunes  of  Mr.  Clay,  but 
the  defeat  of  the  latter  was  brought  about  at  Harrisburg 
by  the  followers  of  General  Winfield  Scott,  who,  though 
unable  to  nominate  their  candidate,  were  yet  able  to  pre 
vent  Mr.  Clay  from  securing  the  coveted  prize,  which 
went  to  William  Henry  Harrison. 

John  Tyler  of  Virginia  was  put  forward  for  the  vice- 
presidency,  his  name  having  been  agreed  upon  among  the 
Whig  leaders  beforehand,  largely  through  the  influence  of 
Wise.  His  nomination  was  a  proof  of  the  States-rights 
character  of  the  party,  Tyler  having  been  from  the  com 
mencement  of  his  political  career  a  consistent  advocate 
of  strict  construction  and  Democratic  principles. 

The  candidates  of  the  Whig  party  did  not  enter  the 


THE   CAMPAIGN   OF    1840  91 

canvass  with  a  hopeful  outlook  before  them,  and  the  para 
phernalia  of  log  cabins,  coonskins,  and  hard  cider  would 
seem  to  have  indicated  an  absence  of  true  issues  or  prin 
ciples  in  the  campaign.  But  underneath  the  claptrap 
and  ad  captandum  arguments  of  the  orators,  a  healthy 
moral  tone  prevailed  in  opposition  to  the  abuses  of  the 
Van  Buren  administration. 

The  convention  of  the  Whig  young  men  of  the  coun 
try,  held  at  Baltimore  the  spring  following  the  one  at 
Harrisburg,  aroused  the  enthusiasm  of  the  masses,  and 
started  the  tidal  wave  which  bore  Harrison  and  Tyler 
into  the  White  House.  Such  an  assemblage  had  never 
been  witnessed  before,  and  the  leading  Whigs  of  the 
Union  —  among  them  Clay,  Webster,  Sergeant,  Preston, 
Southard,  Botts,  and  Wise  —  were  there  to  help  kindle 
with  their  eloquence  the  popular  flame. 

On  the  Fourth  of  July  previous,  at  a  gathering  of 
Whigs,  on  an  island  in  the  Delaware  opposite  Philadel 
phia,  Wise  had  uttered  the  sentiment,  "  The  union  of  the 
Whigs  for  the  sake  of  the  Union,"  which  was  caught  up 
as  a  party  watchword  and  inscribed  on  the  transparen 
cies  during  the  campaign.  A  galaxy  of  Whig  orators 
everywhere  spoke  from  the  hustings  and  made  the  cam 
paign  of  1840  memorable  for  its  enthusiasm.  Wise  was 
untiring  in  his  support  of  the  nominees,  and  from  York- 
town  in  Virginia,  where  he  presided  over  the  Whig  con 
vention  of  his  district,  as  far  north  as  Poughkeepsie  in 
New  York,  lent  the  weight  of  his  voice  and  eloquence 
to  the  cause  of  Harrison  and  Tyler.  The  triumphant 
election  of  the  Whig  ticket  was  not,  however,  in  reality 
a  triumph,  but  the  coming  into  power  of  a  mere  opposi 
tion  party,  composed  of  heterogeneous  elements,  destined 
soon  to  divide  policy  and  action.  This  was  hastened 
rather  than  caused  by  the  death  of  General  Harrison, 


92  THE    LIFE    OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

one  month  after  his  inauguration,  which  placed  Mr.  Tyler 
in  the  presidential  chair,  and  upset  the  calculations  of  the 
followers  of  Mr.  Clay.  Immediately  upon  General  Har 
rison's  election,  Clay  had  assumed  a  dictatorial  atti 
tude  towards  the  incoming  administration,  which  was 
bitterly  resented  by  General  Harrison,  who  clearly  indi 
cated  that  he  would  never  assent  to  the  revival  of  the 
old  National  Republican  measures ;  and  at  the  called  ses 
sion  of  Congress  in  May,  after  Harrison's  death,  Clay 
undertook  the  championship  of  those  policies  which,  prior 
to  the  Harrisburg  convention,  he  had  agreed  to  surren 
der.  Henry  W.  Billiard,  a  spectator  of  what  tran 
spired  at  this  time,  records  in  his  "  Politics  and  Pen 
Pictures  " :  — 

"Visiting  Washington  in  June,  I  found  Congress  in 
session ;  the  signs  of  anarchy  in  the  Whig  party  were 
clearly  visible.  Mr.  Clay,  the  real  leader  of  the  party, 
disclosed  his  purpose  to  compel  the  President  to  accept 
the  measures  which,  as  a  senator,  he  dictated  without 
the  slightest  regard  to  Mr.  Tyler's  antecedents  as  a  states 
man.  Imperious,  unsparing  in  his  denunciation  of  any 
one  who  faltered  in  support  of  his  plans  for  the  gov 
ernment  of  the  country,  he  presented  a  grand  spectacle. 
But  Mr.  Tyler,  with  equal  firmness,  declined  to  submit 
to  the  dictation  of  the  illustrious  senator." 

The  charge  of  "traitor"  was  quickly  applied  to  Mr. 
Tyler  upon  his  vetoing  the  bill  to  recharter  the  United 
States  Bank;  but  to  any  one  at  all  familiar  with  the 
political  career  and  personal  character  of  the  man,  the 
word  was  not  justified,  even  coming  from  baffled  poli 
ticians  whose  designs  he  had  thwarted.  Mr.  T}der, 
throughout  his  public  life,  had  not  only  been  an  avowed 
strict  constructionist,  but  time  and  again  had  declared 
that  in  his  opinion  it  was  unconstitutional  to  charter  a 


MR.  TYLER'S  ADMINISTRATION  93 

United  States  Bank.  During  the  campaign  of  1840,  in 
response  to  inquiries  from  various  citizens,  he  had  pub 
lished  letters  in  which  he  declared  that  his  opinion  upon 
this  point  remained  unchanged ;  but,  in  the  face  of  these 
declarations,  Clay  and  his  followers  believed  that  they 
could  force  him  to  yield  his  life-long  convictions  and 
sign  a  charter.  Mr.  Tyler  held  various  interviews  with 
the  Whig  leaders,  with  a  view  to  arrive  at  an  under 
standing  with  them,  but  never  for  one  instant  aban 
doned  his  well-known  position  in  regard  to  the  Bank 
question. 

It  was  not  long  before  the  President,  and  his  party  in 
Congress,  found  themselves  at  war  with  each  other,  and 
the  small  group  in  the  House  who  championed  his  admin 
istration  were  dubbed  by  Clay  the  "corporal's  guard." 
Among  these,  however,  were  Wise,  Caleb  Gushing,  and 
Thomas  W.  Gilmer,  men  capable  of  withstanding  the  on 
slaught  of  their  opponents.  From  the  first,  Wise  opposed 
the  Bank  agitation,  the  policy  of  protection,  and  the  vari 
ous  measures  revived  by  the  National  Whigs. 

The  administration  of  Mr.  Tyler,  despite  the  violent 
opposition  which  it  met,  was  signalized  by  exceptional 
purity  of  conduct :  the  spoils  system  of  politics  was  done 
away  with,  the  credit  of  the  country  restored,  and  a  bal 
ance  substituted  for  a  deficit  in  the  Treasury. 

The  exchequer  bill,  which  he  drafted  himself,  antici 
pated  by  a  number  of  years  the  present  national  bank  sys 
tem  founded  upon  the  same  idea ;  and  the  foreign  policy 
of  the  administration  was  conducted  in  a  highly  successful 
manner.  Fremont  was  sent  westward  to  explore  the  un 
known  passes  of  the  Rockies,  and  Whitman  aided  in  trans 
porting  bodies  of  emigrants  to  the  Western  country.  In 
all  the  measures  of  Mr.  Tyler's  administration  he  enjoyed 
the  hearty  concurrence  of  Wise,  who  remained  throughout 


94  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

his  close  personal  and  political  friend  and  leading  champion 
on  the  floor  of  the  House. 

Shortly  after  the  election  of  the  Whig  candidate  in  No 
vember,  1840,  Mr.  Tyler  had  written  Wise :  "  In  desiring 
your  views  I  wish  to  prepare  myself  for  playing  my  part 
as  may  best  become  me  should  it  be  required  of  me  to  play 
any  part.  Let  me  also  say,  I  scorn  to  flatter,  that  I  regard 
you  as  having  been  as  much  instrumental  in  bringing  about 
the  present  state  of  things  as  any  man  who  lives,  and  your 
views  of  the  future  should  be  as  much  sought  after  as  your 
opinions  in  the  past."  Although  Wise  had  differed  with 
Mr.  Tyler  as  to  the  constitutionality  and  expediency  of  a 
government  bank,  he  subsequently  abandoned  this  position 
not  only  because  he  realized  that  the  time  had  passed  for 
chartering  a  United  States  Bank,  but  that  issue  had  become 
merged  into  questions  which  he  considered  of  far  greater 
magnitude.  His  position  on  the  Bank  question  up  to  the 
time  of  Harrison's  election  was  identical  with  that  of  Mr. 
Clay.  After  that  time  their  position  was  unlike  in  this,  — 
that  Wise  stood  by  his  abandonment  of  the  Bank,  while 
Clay  who  had  also  abandoned  it,  insisted  upon  reviving  it. 

In  his  attitude  toward  the  spoils  system  of  appointments 
to  office,  few  members  of  the  House  have  taken  bolder  and 
stronger  ground  than  Wise,  and  during  Van  Buren's  ad 
ministration  he  had  declared  "if  government  officers  are 
allowed  to  interfere  in  elections,  yea  required  to  save  their 
salaries  by  their  party  services,  the  Treasury  must  suffer  for 
it ;  for  electioneering  requires  funds,  and  officers  will  not 
take  their  own  money  when  they  can  reach  Uncle  Sam's. 
The  dearest  purchase  ever  made  by  any  people  is  the  pur 
chase  of  themselves  with  their  own  taxes  which  they  have 
paid  into  the  public  Treasury.  I  would  put  down  at  every 
hazard  the  tyranny  of  proscription^  the  most  extravagant 
of  all  tyrannies,  which  is  always  sure  to  turn  out  of  office 


NEGOTIATIONS   FOR   TEXAS  95 

some  honest  and  many  knowing  officers  and  to  put  many 
dishonest  and  ignorant  ones  in  their  places.  I  could  give 
many  instances  under  the  present  and  last  administra 
tions  from  this  cause  alone.  Appoint  the  virtue  and  intel 
ligence  of  the  country  to  office  without  regard  to  party  services 
and  you  will  find  thousands  of  dollars  gained  as  well  as 
thousands  saved  by  that  simple  operation  of  finance." 

Few  men  have  ever  been  more  bitterly  assailed  than 
Mr.  Tyler  by  his  political  opponents,  but  despite  that  fact 
many  of  the  most  important  offices  at  his  disposal  were 
filled  by  those  opposed  to  him  politically. 

The  most  important  act  of  Mr.  Tyler's  administration 
must  be  held  to  be  the  annexation  of  Texas  to  the  Union. 
It  is  a  circumstance  worthy  of  note  that  all  the  great 
acquisitions  of  territory  to  our  country  up  to  this  time 
were  secured  under  the  leadership  of  Virginians,  and 
the  addition  of  Texas  to  the  sisterhood  of  States  was 
destined  to  form  no  exception  to  this  rule.  In  1837 
Texas  had  unsuccessfully  applied  for  membership  in  the 
Union,  and  Wise  had  strongly  advocated  the  measure. 
This  question  was  taken  up  by  Tyler  shortly  after  he 
became  President,  in  accordance  with  the  urgent  advice 
of  Wise,  who  warmly  supported  him  as  did  Thomas  W. 
Gilmer  and  Caleb  Gushing.  Texas  was  already  look 
ing  to  England  for  aid,  being  deeply  in  debt  to  British 
capitalists,  and  the  latter  country  was  anxious  to  build 
up  a  rival  to  the  United  States  along  its  southern  bor 
der;  while  the  abolitionists  abroad  were  striving  to  have 
slavery  done  away  with  in  Texas  so  that  the  institution 
might  be  attacked  from  the  South.  The  negotiations  for 
annexation  which  had  not  culminated  at  the  time  of 
Upshur's  death  in  February,  1844,  just  after  Tyler  had 
tendered  him  the  position  of  Secretary,  rendered  it  highly 
important  that  a  man  in  sympathy  with  the  measure 


96  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

should  be  appointed  to  succeed  him  as  Secretary  of  State. 
This  fact  alone  can  serve  as  an  excuse  for  Wise's  con 
duct  upon  the  occasion.  The  morning  following  Upshur's 
death,  caused  by  the  explosion  of  a  cannon  on  board  the 
Princeton,  and  without  authority  from  any  one,  Wise 
hastened  to  Senator  McDuffie's  rooms,  and  requested  him 
to  tender  the  position  to  John  C.  Calhoun.  Having  done 
this,  he  then  proceeded  to  the  White  House,  where  he 
breakfasted  with  the  President  and  informed  him  of  what 
he  had  done.  The  latter,  naturally  indignant  at  the  time, 
nevertheless  acquiesced  in  the  act  as  one  which  could  not 
easily  be  remedied.  The  President  had,  through  Upshur, 
secured  pledges  of  support  from  over  two-thirds  of  the 
senators  in  favor  of  the  Texas  treaty,  and  his  fear  was 
that  Calhoun's  appointment  might  drive  off  Benton  and 
other  senators  of  the  Van  Buren  wing  of  the  Democratic 
party.  And  this  fear  appears  to  have  been  not  wholly 
unfounded,  as  the  vote  finally  given  in  favor  of  the  treaty 
was  only  one-third  instead  of  two-thirds,  as  required  by 
the  Constitution. 

Wise  thus  describes  the  part  taken  by  him  immediately 
upon  hearing  of  Upshur's  death.1  "  We  came  at  once  to 
our  conclusions.  Mr.  Webster  remained  in  the  Cabinet 
until  the  Northeastern  question  was  settled,  and  as  long 
as  Upshur  or  Legare  was  alive,  the  Southwestern  question 
was  safe  in  Southern  hands  ;  but  now  that  they  both  were 
taken  away,  there  was  one  man  left  who  was  necessary 
above  all  others  to  the  South  in  settling  and  obtaining  the 
annexation  of  Texas.  We  need  hardly  say  that  man  was 
John  C.  Calhoun  of  South  Carolina.  But  we  knew  that, 
for  some  reason  of  which  we  were  never  informed,  the 
President  was  opposed  to  calling  him  to  his  Cabinet.  It 
is  vain  to  conjecture  the  reason,  and  we  are  utterly  unable 
1 "  Seven  Decades,"  p.  221. 


A   VACANCY   IN  THE   CABINET  97 

to  account  for  the  fact,  but  the  fact  was  known,  and  that 
caused  us  to  be  guilty  of  assuming  an  authority  and  tak 
ing  a  liberty  with  the  President  which  few  men  would 
have  excused  and  few  would  have  taken.  We  thought 
of  Mr.  McDuffie,  then  in  the  Senate,  and  determined  to 
act  through  him.  The  President,  in  1843,  at  the  instance 
of  the  Hon.  Baillie  Peyton,  had  sent  our  name  to  the 
Senate  for  the  mission  to  France,  and  the  nomination  was 
rejected  at  a  moment  when  it  was  the  rule  of  party  not 
to  allow  him  to  have  any  of  his  own  friends  in  appoint 
ments  when  the  Opposition  could  prevent.  Thus,  Mr. 
Gushing,  for  the  Treasury,  Mr.  Porter  of  Pennsylvania, 
for  the  War,  and  Mr.  Henshaw  of  Massachusetts,  for  the 
Navy,  were  all  rejected;  and  when  our  name  for  France 
was  before  the  Senate,  and  the  doctrine  was  openly  avowed 
that  the  President  should  not  be  allowed  to  have  his  own 
friends  in  place,  Mr.  McDuffie  had  met  the  dogma  as  it 
deserved,  and  denounced  it  with  great  cogency  and  spirit. 
Our  nomination  hardly  deserved  the  defence  he  made,  but 
its  natural  effect  was  to  draw  us  to  him  in  personal  grati 
tude  for  the  vindication  which  it  caused  in  1843-44  by 
the  confirmation  of  our  mission  to  Brazil.  We  determined, 
through  him,  to  act  on  Mr.  Calhoun,  whilst  we  took  un 
precedented  license  with  Mr.  Tyler.  Before  breakfast, 
by  sunrise  the  next  morning,  the  29th  of  February,  1844, 
we  visited  Mr.  McDuffie's  parlor.  He  was  not  dressed, 
but  came  down  in  his  slippers  and  robe-de-chambre.  We 
excused  our  calling  so  early  by  the  exigency  arising  from 
the  catastrophe  on  board  the  Princeton,  and  immediately 
inquired  whether  Mr.  Calhoun,  in  his  opinion,  could  be 
prevailed  on  to  accept  the  State  Department  with  a  view 
to  the  vital  question  of  annexation.  He  admitted  the 
magnitude  of  the  interest  involved,  and  how  desirable  it 
was  to  have  it  negotiated  by  Mr.  Calhoun,  but  feared  he 


98  THE    LIFE   OF    HENBY   A.  WISE 

would  not  accept.  We  then  urged  him  to  write  to  Mr. 
Calhoun  immediately,  saying  that  his  name  would,  in  all 
probability,  be  sent  to  the  Senate  at  once,  and  begging 
him  not  to  decline  the  office  if  his  nomination  should  be 
made  and  confirmed.  Mr.  McDuffie's  delicacy  toward 
us  doubtless  prevented  him  from  inquiring  whether  we 
spoke  by  Mr.  Tyler's  authority  or  not,  and  we  made  no 
statement  to  him  pro  or  con  on  that  point,  but  presume 
he  must  have  supposed  that  we  were  authorized  to  make 
the  request,  for  he  promised  to  write  to  Mr.  Calhoun  at 
once. 

"  On  parting  from  him  we  went  directly  to  the  presi 
dential  mansion  to  breakfast.  At  the  gate  of  the  White 
House  grounds  we  met  Judge  John  B.  Christian  of  Vir 
ginia,  the  brother-in-law  of  Mr.  Tyler,  and,  when  we 
reached  the  house,  found  Mr.  Tyler  and  Dr.  Miller, 
another  brother-in-law  of  his,  in  the  breakfast  room.  Mr. 
Tyler  was  standing  with  his  right  elbow  resting  on  the 
mantel  of  the  fireplace,  and  held  a  morning  paper  in  his 
left  hand,  containing  an  account  of  the  awful  catastrophe 
of  the  day  before.  As  soon  as  he  saw  us  he  accosted  us 
with  tremulous  emotion,  saying  how  humbled  he  was  by 
his  providential  escape  whilst  such  invaluable  friends  had 
fallen  from  around  him,  and  he  turned  his  face  to  the 
wall  in  a  flood  of  tears.  We  came  to  his  relief  at  once 
by  saying  that  it  was  no  time  for  mourning  or  wasting 
himself  in  grief,  —  that  the  moment  called  for  prompt 
action  and  attention  to  duty,  and  that  his  work  was  press 
ing  and  heavy.  It  was  an  auspicious  time,  at  least,  to 
nominate  for  the  vacancies  in  his  Cabinet,  when  the  dig 
nity  and  solemnity  of  public  grief  for  so  great  a  calamity 
would  shame  and  hush  all  factious  opposition,  and  human 
sympathy  alone  at  such  a  moment  would  confirm  the 
nominations  he  would  then  make  to  the  Senate.  There 


THE   NOMINATION   OF   CALHOUN  99 

were  too  many  important  affairs  to  be  disposed  of  in  this 
last  year  of  his  term  of  office  to  admit  of  delay.  He  must 
subdue  his  grief  and  find  relief,  the  best  relief,  in  turning 
to  his  tasks.  He  asked  at  once,  '  What  is  to  be  done  ? ' 
The  answer  was  ready:  'Your  most  important  work  is 
the  annexation  of  Texas,  and  the  man  for  that  work  is 
Mr.  Calhoun.  Send  for  him  at  once.' 

"  His  air  changed  at  once,  and  he  quickly  and  firmly 
said,  4  No :  Texas  is  important,  but  Mr.  Calhoun  is  not  the 
man  of  my  choice.' 

"  Aided  by  Judge  Christian  and  Dr.  Miller,  we  reasoned 
with  him,  though  in  vain,  until  the  bell  rang  for  breakfast. 
At  the  table  the  conversation  turned  on  the  calamity  of 
the  previous  day;  and  the  President  gave  a  minute  de 
scription  of  the  manner  in  which,  by  the  most  trivial  cir 
cumstance,  he  had  been  detained  in  the  cabin  at  the  table 
with  the  ladies,  whilst  Stockton,  Upshur,  Kennon,  Marcy, 
Gardner,  and  Benton  all  went  up  on  deck  to  witness  the 
trial  of  the  Peacemaker !  During  the  whole  breakfast  we 
were  exceedingly  uneasy,  thinking  how  we  should  prevail 
upon  him  to  nominate  Mr.  Calhoun  and  justify  us  to 
Mr.  McDuffie.  Of  this  we  were  assured,  that  if  Mr.  Mc- 
Duffie's  letter  reached  Mr.  Calhoun  before  a  nomination 
was  made,  he,  Mr.  Calhoun,  would  decline  the  nomination, 
and  thus  waive  our  committal  to  Mr.  McDuffie;  but  if 
Mr.  Tyler  should  nominate  before  Mr.  Calhoun  replied, 
declining,  then  we  would  be  in  an  awkward  position,  as 
having  made  an  implied  committal  to  his  nomination.  But 
'  the  policy  of  rashness '  saved  us,  as  it  had  often  done  be 
fore  and  has  often  done  since,  and  sent  in  Mr.  Calhoun's 
nomination.  As  soon  as  breakfast  was  over,  we  rose,  hat 
in  hand,  to  depart,  went  with  some  impressiveness  of  man 
ner  directly  up  to  Mr.  Tyler,  and  said :  '  Sir,  in  saying  good 
morning  to  you  now,  I  may  be  taking  a  lasting  farewell. 


100  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

I  have  unselfishly  tried  to  be  your  friend  and  to  aid  your 
administration  of  public  affairs,  and  have,  doubtless,  your 
kind  feelings  and  confidence ;  but  I  fear  I  have  done  that 
which  will  forfeit  your  confidence  and  cause  us  to  be 
friends  no  longer.  You  say  that  you  will  not  nominate 
Mr.  Calhoun  as  your  Secretary  of  State.  If  so,  then  I 
have  done  both  you  and  him  a  great  wrong,  and  must  go 
immediately  to  Mr.  McDuffie  to  apologize  for  causing  him 
to  commit  himself,  and  you  too,  by  an  unauthorized  act  of 
mine.' 

"  '  What  do  you  mean  ? '  exclaimed  the  President,  evi 
dently  disturbed. 

" '  I  mean  that  this  morning,  before  coming  here,  unin 
vited,  to  breakfast,  I  went  to  Mr.  McDuifie  and  prevailed 
on  him  to  write  to  Mr.  Calhoun  and  ask  him  to  accept  the 
place  of  Secretary  of  State  at  your  hands.' 

" '  Did  you  say  you  went  at  my  instance  to  make  that 
request  ? ' 

" '  No,  I  did  not  in  words,  but  my  act,  as  your  known 
friend,  implied  as  much,  and  Mr.  McDuffie  was  too  much 
of  a  gentleman  to  ask  me  whether  I  had  authority  express 
from  you.  I  went  to  him  without  your  authority,  for  the 
very  reason  that  I  knew  I  could  not  obtain  it ;  and  I  did 
not  tell  Mr.  McDuffie  that  I  had  not  your  authority,  for  I 
knew  he  would  not  in  that  case  have  written  to  Mr.  Cal 
houn  as  I  had  requested.  And  now,  if  you  do  not  sanc 
tion  what  I  have  done,  you  will  place  me  where  you  would 
be  loath  to  place  a  foe,  much  less  a  friend.  I  can  hardly 
be  your  friend  any  longer  unless  you  sanction  my  unauthor 
ized  act  for  your  own  sake,  not  my  own.' 

"  He  looked  at  us  in  utter  surprise  for  some  minutes,  and 
then  lifting  both  hands,  said :  '  Well,  you  are  the  most 
extraordinary  man  I  ever  saw  !  —  the  most  wilful  and  way 
ward,  the  most  incorrigible !  and  therefore  there  is  no  help 


THE   ANNEXATION    OF   TEXAS  101 

for  it.  No  one  else  would  have  done  it  in  this  way  but  you, 
and  you  are  the  only  man  who  could  have  done  it  with  me. 
Take  the  office  and  tender  it  to  Mr.  Calhoun;  I  doubtless 
am  wrong  in  refusing  the  services  of  such  a  man.  You 
may  write  to  him  yourself  at  once.' 

"  We  answered  that  we  would  do  no  such  thing,  for  if 
Mr.  Calhoun  was  given  time  to  do  so  he  would  decline ; 
and  we  therefore  asked  that  his  name  should  be  sent  to 
the  Senate  at  once,  when  it  would  be  confirmed,  and  then 
he  could  not  decline.  This  was  done;  Mr.  Calhoun's 
nomination  was  sent  in  and  confirmed  even  before  Mr. 
McDuffie's  letter  reached  him." 

Although  the  treaty  which  was  concluded  through  Cal 
houn's  negotiations  April  12,  1844,  was  rejected  by  the 
Senate,  the  issue  of  annexation  caused  the  defeat  of  both 
Clay  and  Van  Buren  and  the  election  of  Polk  that  year, 
which  was  regarded  as  an  indorsement  of  the  measure. 
At  the  following  session,  a  joint  resolution  providing  for 
annexation  passed  both  branches  of  Congress,  and  on  the 
last  day  of  his  term  Tyler  despatched  a  special  messenger 
to  secure  the  assent  of  the  Texan  Congress,  which  was 
unanimously  given. 

Despite  the  unpopularity  of  Tyler's  administration  at  the 
time,  and  the  small  minority  in  which  his  supporters  in 
Congress  found  themselves,  Wise  wrote  afterward  from 
Rio  to  his  friend  Caleb  Gushing:  "If  I  live  a  thousand 
years  I  shall  look  back  to  our  lone  position  and  single- 
handed  fights  for  truth  and  fair  play  from  '41  to  '44  with 
the  greatest  pride  and  pleasure.  The  administration  of 
Tyler,  with  all  its  domestic  and  internal  follies  and  weak 
nesses,  —  you  and  I  know  all,  —  was  great  in  all  its  leading 
public  measures.  Its  glorious  successes  in  foreign  policy, 
its  peace  of  Florida,  its  regulation  of  finance  without  aid 
in  spite  of  opposition,  its  general  integrity  of  administra- 


102 


THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.   WISE 


tion,  will  be  perpetual  mementos  of  great  wisdom  and 
virtue,  whilst  all  the  small  things  will  be  forgotten. 
Twenty-five  years  hence  it  will  be  brighter  and  brighter 
praise  to  have  been  a  member  of  the  corps  of  '  Corporal's 
Guard.'  " 

During  the  session  of  1842-43,  Wise's  health  became 
much  enfeebled,  partly  from  a  long  spell  of  fever,  and 
President  Tyler  urged  him  to  resign  his  seat  and  to  accept 
any  foreign  mission  at  his  disposal.  This  he  declined, 
but  early  in  1843  Mr.  Tyler  nominated  him  as  minister 
to  France.  Owing  to  the  influence  of  Clay  and  other 
Whigs  whom  Wise  had  antagonized,  the  Senate  refused 
to  confirm  him ;  although  prior  to  the  death  of  Harrison, 
Clay  had  urged  Wise  to  accept  any  foreign  appointment 
at  the  President's  disposal. 

In  the  spring  of  1843,  Wise  was  a  candidate  for  reelec 
tion  and  every  effort  was  put  forward  by  the  Whigs  to 
bring  about  his  defeat,  and  Mr.  Hill  Carter  of  Shirley 
was  selected  as  the  candidate  to  oppose  him.  Mr.  Carter, 
who  had  served  in  his  earlier  years  with  distinction  as  a 
naval  officer  under  Commodore  Warrington,  resided  at  his 
estate,  "  Shirley,"  on  James  River,  and  was  a  great  favor 
ite  with  the  Whigs.  Many  thought  that  the  design  in 
nominating  Mr.  Carter  was  to  produce  a  personal  conflict 
between  him  and  Wise,  but  their  relations  were  very 
friendly,  and  Mr.  Carter  became  so  attached  to  Wise  that 
during  the  campaign  he  insisted  that  Wise  should  accom 
pany  him  in  his  private  vehicle,  and  ever  afterward  they 
were  warm  personal  friends. 

As  the  home  of  the  President  and  of  Judge  Upshur,  the 
result  in  Wise's  district  was  anxiously  watched,  and  the 
Whigs  were  more  than  ever  eager  to  redeem  the  district. 
The  district  at  the  time  included  the  two  eastern  shore 
counties,  Accomack  and  Northampton,  and  on  the  west- 


CANVASSING   THE   ACCOMACK   DISTRICT  103 

ern  shore  the  counties  of  Northumberland,  Lancaster,  Mid 
dlesex,  Gloucester,  York,  Warwick,  Charles  City,  James 
City,  New  Kent,  and  Elizabeth  City,  thus  extending  from 
the  Maryland  line  to  Cape  Charles  on  the  eastern  side  of 
the  Chesapeake,  and  from  the  mouth  of  the  Potomac  to 
that  of  the  James  on  the  western  shore. 

The  Richmond  Whig,  the  leading  organ  of  the  party  in 
the  South,  alluded,  during  the  campaign,  to  the  fact  that  the 
district  had  in  1840  given  the  largest  Whig  majority  in  the 
State  —  nearly  fifteen  hundred  —  and  hoped  for  the  defeat 
of  Wise  as  Tyler's  representative.  Few  representatives, 
however,  have  ever  possessed  in  a  more  marked  degree  the 
esteem  and  affection  of  their  constituents  than  did  Wise, 
and  his  eloquent  voice  was  heard  during  the  canvass  at 
every  county  seat  and  hamlet  rallying  his  followers.  For 
tunately  for  him  he  knew  his  district  —  at  least  the  older 
portion  of  it  —  from  end  to  end,  and  in  after  years  in  testi 
fying  on  the  subject  of  the  Maryland  boundary  line  he  said  : 
"  I  represented  the  Accomack  district  of  Virginia  eleven 
years  in  Congress.  I  dare  say  that  from  January,  1833,  to 
February,  1844,  when  I  resigned  my  seat  in  the  House  of 
Representatives,  no  Congressional  district  in  Virginia  was 
ever  more  thoroughly  canvassed  by  its  representative  or 
better  known  by  him  than  my  district  was  by  me.  I  visited 
every  county  on  both  shores  of  the  Chesapeake  every  year, 
and  then  without  the  facility  of  steam,  had  to  travel  by 
sail  vessels  and  in  canoes  quite  as  much  as  by  carriages. 
The  mode  of  traversing  a  district  so  cut  up  by  bays,  rivers, 
and  creeks  was  very  dilatory  and  difficult,  and  compelled 
me  to  be  better  informed  of  localities  than  I  could  ever 
have  been  if  travelling  by  steam,  or  with  more  facility  or 
rapidity.  I  have  passed  up  and  down  the  Chesapeake 
innumerable  times  to  and  from  Baltimore  and  Norfolk, 
had  to  cross  and  recross  to  and  from  the  eastern  and  west- 


104  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY    A.   WISE 

ern  shores,  and  I  became  familiar  with  every  main,  creek, 
island,  and  headland,  so  that  I  could  pilot  myself  very  well 
in  emergency,  by  my  knowledge  generally  of  courses,  dis 
tances,  and  bearings.  I  have  been  twice  stranded  on  the 
shoals  of  the  eastern  shore,  once  had  to  take  command  of 
the  vessel  on  which  I  was  a  passenger,  and  thrice  was  in 
peril  of  my  life.  ...  I  was  somewhat  practised  in  sailing, 
and,  I  may  say,  as  well  informed  about  the  shores  as  any 
one  not  a  skipper  and  pilot  by  profession.  The  first  time 
I  took  my  seat  in  the  House  of  Representatives  I  had  to 
sail  up  the  Potomac  to  Washington,  which  I  had  done 
several  times  before  when  a  law  student,  passing  to  and 
from  Winchester  and  my  home  in  Accomack." 

But  his  knowledge  of  the  localities  in  his  district  was 
not  exceeded  by  his  acquaintance  with  the  people  of  every 
class,  and  though  many  were  disposed  to  censure  him  for 
his  severe  denunciation  of  Clay  and  the  Whigs,  yet  at  the 
election  which  took  place,  Wise  achieved  a  signal  victory 
and  was  returned  by  a  good  majority. 

A  gentleman1  of  Gloucester  County,  now  living,  has 
given  the  writer  a  description  of  Wise's  appearance  on  the 
hustings  at  Matthews  Courthouse  during  the  campaign, 
and  how  a  party  of  excited  Whigs  endeavored  to  prevent 
him  from  addressing  the  people,  by  breaking  up  the  meet 
ing,  but  before  he  had  finished  his  speech,  many  of  the 
same  men  were  throwing  up  their  hats  in  the  air,  and 
cheering  for  him. 

After  his  return  to  Congress,  Wise's  health  continued 
much  impaired,  and  Mr.  Tyler  sent  in  his  name  to  the 
Senate  as  minister  to  Brazil.  The  same  group  of  sena 
tors  who  had  several  times  refused  to  confirm  his  nomina 
tion  for  the  mission  to  France,  were  inclined  to  defeat  his 
appointment  to  Brazil,  especially  on  account  of  his  con- 
1  General  William  B.  Taliaferro  who  died  since  the  above  was  written. 


PARTING    ADVICE   TO    CONSTITUENTS  105 

tinned  opposition  and  denunciation  of  Clay  during  his 
campaign  for  Congress,  but  William  S.  Archer,  senator 
from  Virginia,  although  a  Whig,  demanded  his  confir 
mation  by  the  Senate,  which  was  accordingly  done  ;  and 
on  February  8,  1844,  Wise  resigned  his  seat  in  Con 
gress. 

Before  leaving  home  for  Brazil  he  issued  an  address  to  his 
former  constituents,  in  which  he  wrote,  "  At  the  earliest 
eligible  period  of  life  you  took  me  up  a  poor  boy,  without 
adequate  merit,  and  you  have  ever  since  upheld  me  by 
your  gracious  confidence,  though  my  faults  and  infirmities 
have  been  many  and  great."  His  parting  advice  to  them 
was  to  tax  themselves,  for  the  purpose  of  paying  the  State 
debt,  and  of  promoting  public  free  schools  among  them. 
The  urgent  need  of  the  last  named  was  evidenced  by  the 
statistics  which  he  cited,  which  showed  that  in  the  coun 
ties  of  his  district,  of  the  whole  number  of  free  white 
persons,  who  numbered  37,230,  nearly  one-eighth  could  not 
read  and  write,  while  of  the  whole  number  of  free  whites 
above  the  age  of  twenty  years  more  than  one-fourth  could 
not  read  and  write.  In  commenting  on  these  and  other 
facts  connected  with  the  subject,  Wise  wrote  :  "  This  is 
a  lamentable  condition  of  education  among  us.  I  would 
never  have  exposed  it  to  the  scoff  or  the  pity  of  the  world, 
but  our  own  census  takers  have  already  made  report 
thereof  to  the  Department  of  State  of  the  United  States, 
and  Congress  has  printed  these  facts  at  public  expense. 
I  know  that  a  very  large  body  of  our  people  is  among  the 
most  intelligent,  and  some  of  them  among  the  most  learned 
of  the  country;  I  know  how  much  credit  and  honor  are  due 
to  some  of  our  parents,  who  have  not  only  rubbed  nature's 
rust  off  their  sons  at  common  schools,  but  have  polished 
their  minds  bright,  not  only  at  our  own  colleges  and  uni 
versities,  but  at  the  universities  of  Europe.  I  know  what 


106  THE   LIFE   OF   HENKY   A.  WISE 

a  body  of  well-instructed  gentlemen  we  have,  who  would 
do  honor  to  any  society  of  any  Athens  in  the  land ;  how 
gracefully  they  live  in  all  the  means  of  the  light  of  learn 
ing  ;  what  a  venerable  alma  mater  of  great  men  we  have 
in  old  William  and  Mary  College ;  what  a  select  corps  of 
professors  and  teachers  become  our  seminaries ;  what  a 
fine  body  of  young  graduates  yearly  come  out  from  our 
own  and  the  Northern  schools ;  what  an  eminent  profes 
sional  corps,  both  in  law  and  in  medicine,  minister  to  our 
minds  as  well  as  to  our  physical  and  pecuniary  cases  ; 
what  active  industry,  enterprise,  and  intelligence  there  are 
among  the  great  body  of  our  farmers  and  planters  and 
mechanics ;  I  know  how  to  account  for  much  of  the  want 
of  learning  among  our  people  from  their  geographical 
location  —  living  as  many  of  them  do,  on  islands  and  long 
peninsulas,  inconvenient  to  schools ;  and  how  much  igno 
rance  is  to  be  attributed  to  the  valuable  labor  of  poor  chil 
dren,  whose  poor  parents  cannot  spare  their  time  at  schools, 
precious  as  it  is,  to  procure  their  daily  bread.  I  know 
all  these  consoling  excuses,  but  still  the  fact  stares  us  in 
the  face,  that  more  than  four  thousand  poor  children  in 
our  district  are  growing  up  in  the  night  of  ignorance. 
Most  of  these,  doubtless,  are  female  children,  and  the 
touching  fact  is  presented  that  many  mothers  of  the  gen 
eration  to  follow  will  not  be  able  to  teach  their  sons  and 
daughters  to  read  and  write." 

His  urgent  advice  to  his  constituents  was  to  organize 
and  tax  themselves  in  their  several  counties,  and  not  to 
wait  for  State  aid  to  public  schools.  Despite  the  large 
percentage  of  illiteracy,  however,  then  prevalent,  many  of 
the  children  were  educated  at  the  "  old  field  "  schools, 
where  they  received  oftentimes  more  thorough  instruction 
than  at  the  public  schools  to-day  ;  and  although  but  few 
newspapers  circulated  among  the  country  people  in  that 


HIS   SECOND   MARRIAGE  107 

part  of  Virginia,  yet  they  were  generally,  through  means 
of  the  intercourse  held  with  the  sea-captains,  and  with  each 
other  at  the  warrant  tryings  and  County  Court,  kept  well 
informed  as  to  public  affairs. 

In  November,  1840,  Wise  was  married  to  Miss  Sarah 
Sergeant,  the  daughter  of  Hon.  John  Sergeant  of  Phila 
delphia,  a  woman  of  attractive  person  and  polished  mind. 
After  resigning  his  seat  in  Congress,  he  repaired  to  his 
home  in  Accomack  to  arrange  his  household  and  private 
affairs,  preparatory  to  setting  sail  for  Brazil. 


CHAPTER   VIII 

TRIP  TO  BRAZIL  ON  BOARD  THE  "CONSTITUTION."  LIFE  AT 
RIO.  THE  AFRICAN  SLAVE-TRADE.  VISIT  OF  GENERAL  SHER 
MAN.  EVENTS  LEADING  TO  WISE5S  RETURN 

HAVING  completed  arrangements  for  his  departure  from 
home  and  received  his  instructions  at  Washington,  Wise 
embarked  on  the  frigate  Constitution,  with  Captain  Per- 
cival,  and  on  the  twenty-ninth  day  of  May,  1844,  sailed 
from  New  York.  He  was  received  aboard  ship  with  a 
salute  of  cannon,  and  the  old  antagonist  of  the  Cruerriere 
"  set  every  threadbare  sail "  for  the  voyage  that  lay  before 
her.  Accompanying  him  were  his  wife  and  five  children 
—  one  an  infant  in  arms  —  and  several  domestics.  After 
a  pleasant,  though  protracted  voyage  of  sixty-two  days, 
during  which  they  touched  at  Orto  in  Fayal,  at  Funchal 
in  Madeira,  and  at  Santa  Cruz  in  Teneriffe,  having  lain 
by  in  all  seventeen  days,  they  entered  on  the  2d  of 
August  the  beautiful  harbor  of  Rio. 

A  few  days  later  Wise  was  granted  a  cordial  reception 
at  the  office  of  the  Minister  of  Foreign  Affairs,  and  by  the 
Emperor  Dom  Pedro  II.  at  his  palace  at  Boavista,  where 
mutual  expressions  of  good-will  and  wishes  for  the  pros 
perity  of  Brazil  and  the  United  States  were  exchanged. 

The  then  Emperor  of  Brazil  was  but  eighteen  years  of 
age,  although  the  government  had  declared  his  majority 
some  four  years  previously,  to  prevent  his  sister,  the 
Princess  Donna  Januaria,  from  occupying  the  throne. 

108 


THE  COURT   OF   BRAZIL  109 

Wise,  in  one  of  his  letters  at  the  time,  describes  the 
youthful  ruler  as  "rather  grave,  studious,  and  monastic 
in  his  habits." 

Within  a  few  weeks  after  his  landing  at  Rio,  Wise 
had  installed  himself  and  family  in  a  residence  located 
in  the  Engenho  Velho,  and  had  assumed  the  work  of  his 
mission  at  the  office  of  the  legation.  The  etiquette  of  the 
Court  and  social  observances  appear  to  have  had  little 
charm  for  his  republican  heart,  and  he  wrote  that  "the 
only  reward  for  going  and  waiting  for  hours  on  a  hot 
day,  in  a  hot  uniform,  is  to  make  three  bows  forward  and 
three  bows  backward  and  then  bob  out  of  Imperial  Pres 
ence."  His  duties,  for  the  most  part,  were  of  the  usual 
ministerial  character,  and  he  doubtless  found  life  at  Rio 
dull,  after  the  political  excitement  of  Washington.  Though 
he  did  not  speak  Portuguese,  he  found  no  trouble  in  conduct 
ing  the  business  of  his  office,  with  the  aid  of  an  interpreter, 
and  was,  moreover,  greatly  assisted  in  his  correspondence 
by  his  wife,  who  was  an  accomplished  linguist. 

The  claims  of  American  citizens,  prize  causes,  questions 
arising  in  connection  with  the  construction  of  treaties,  the 
arrangement  of  tariff  schedules,  and  troubles  growing  out 
of  the  arrest  of  American  seamen  occupied  a  large  portion 
of  the  time  of  the  minister  at  the  Court  of  Brazil.  In 
connection  with  these,  there  is  little  or  nothing  of  interest, 
or  that  deserves  to  be  noted  here. 

There  was  one  subject,  however,  to  which  he  devoted 
his  best  energies  while  at  Rio,  worthy  of  being  recalled 
and  of  more  than  passing  interest. 

At  that  time  the  slave-trade  between  Africa  and  Brazil 
was  actively  carried  on,  and  although  a  treaty  had  been 
entered  into  between  England  and  Brazil,  as  far  back  as 
the  year  1826,  for  the  abolition  of  this  traffic,  it  had  by  no 
means  been  suppressed.  While  Sir  Robert  Peel,  the  Earl 


110  THE   LIFE   OF   HENHY   A.  WISE 

of  Aberdeen,  and  other  British  statesmen  inveighed  against 
the  slave-trade,  many  English  merchants  were  still  largely 
interested  in  it,  and  among  the  Brazilians  the  practice  was 
not  only  common,  but  the  mining  and  planting  interests 
were  anxious  for  the  continued  importation  of  slaves.  By 
virtue  of  what  was  known  as  the  Aberdeen  Act,  passed 
in  1845,  England  asserted  the  right  of  seizing  suspected 
vessels  in  Brazilian  waters,  and  public  sentiment  had  been 
aroused  to  some  extent  toward  the  suppression  of  the 
traffic. 

The  subject  of  the  slave-trade  had  an  important  bearing 
on  the  relations  existing  between  the  United  States  and 
Brazil,  as  numerous  American  bottoms  were  converted 
into  slave-ships,  and  the  slave-dealers  eagerly  availed 
themselves  of  immunity  from  search  gained  by  the  use 
of  the  American  flag.  From  the  time  of  his  landing 
at  Rio,  in  August,  1844,  until  his  return  home  three 
years  later,  Wise  was  unremitting  in  his  efforts  to  have 
those  engaged  in  the  traffic  arrested  and  to  bring  the 
matter  to  the  attention  of  the  Department  at  Washington, 
and  indirectly  to  that  of  the  British  Parliament,  and  prob 
ably  did  more  than  any  one  at  the  Court  of  Brazil  to  arouse 
public  sentiment  in  this  particular. 

In  a  letter  to  Messrs.  Maxwell,  Wright  &  Co.,  mer 
chants  at  Rio,  dated  December  9,  1844,  he  gave  his  views 
of  the  subject  as  follows:  "It  cannot  be  denied  and  is 
no  longer  to  be  concealed,  and  the  sooner  all  parties  at 
home  and  abroad  are  informed  of  it  the  better,  that  there 
is  no  trade  whatever  between  the  coast  of  Africa  and 
Brazil,  but  what  partakes  directly  or  indirectly  of  the 
nature  and  of  the  profits  or  losses  of  the  slave-trade.  The 
slave-trade  is  the  main,  the  staple  business,  and  all  other 
trade,  with  the  slightest  exception,  is  accessory,  or  aux 
iliary  to  it,  between  that  coast,  particularly  the  parts 


THE   SLAVE-TKADE  111 

about  Congo  and  Cabinda  and  Brazil.  And  no  vessels 
of  the  United  States  are  chartered  for  that  coast  in  this 
country,  but  to  export  goods,  provisions,  and  munitions  of 
war,  to  make  funds  for  the  slave-trade ;  or  they  are 
chartered  to  carry  and  bring  news  of  vessels  employed 
in  the  slave-trade,  and  to  be  tenders  of  those  vessels  in 
other  respects ;  or  they  are  chartered  to  cover  their  sales 
and  to  obtain  the  protection  of  their  flag  until  they  come 
to  be  delivered  on  the  coast  and  ship  their  cargoes  of 
slaves.  And  they  are  chartered  by  and  sold  to  none,  or 
scarcely  ever  to  any  one,  except  notorious  slave-dealers, 
and  are  consigned  in  almost  every  instance  to  their  known 
agents  in  Africa.  And  extraordinary  prices  are  given  for 
the  vessels  and  the  charters  of  vessels  of  the  United  States, 
because  their  national  flag  alone  protects  them  from  visit 
and  search.  And  all  this  is  so  notorious  here,  and  the 
ways  and  means  of  doing  this  are  so  well  known  here,  the 
charter  parties  being  almost  stereotyped,  that  there  is 
not  an  intelligent,  observing,  or  inquiring  citizen  of  the 
United  States  in  Rio  Janeiro,  who  has  resided  here  three 
months,  but  what  may  be  said  to  know  and  could,  with 
the  legal  means,  easily  verify  the  objects,  purposes,  and 
interests  for  which  such  charters  and  sales  of  vessels  de 
liverable  on  the  coast  of  Africa  are  made.  And  the  gen 
eral  knowledge  and  the  general  intent  could  in  almost 
every  instance  be  proved,  if  there  was  full  power  to  com 
pel  the  attendance  of  witnesses,  and  to  make  them  answer 
under  oath.  The  vessel  is  apparently  chartered  by  the 
month,  at  so  much  per  month,  for  the  coast  to  cover  her 
on  the  voyage  to  Africa  with  the  United  States  flag.  The 
charter  party  binds  her  to  take  over  passengers,  meaning  a 
Brazilian  or  Portuguese  master  and  crew,  who  are  in  fact 
to  navigate  her  back  with  a  cargo  of  slaves,  without  either 
flag,  papers,  or  nationality,  running  all  risks  of  capture. 


112  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.   WISE 

But  she  has,  in  fact,  been  actually  sold  deliverable  on  the 
coasts ;  the  whole  or  greater  part  of  her  purchase-money 
has  been  advanced  here  as  security  for  the  sale :  her 
charter  and  sale  have  been  negotiated  by  an  English 
broker,  directly  with  the  slave-dealer,  and  he  gets  two  and 
a  half  per  cent  commission.  The  advance  of  the  purchase- 
money  here  is  security,  and  the  guarantee  of  the  payment 
of  the  whole  charter  and  sale  is  made,  and  two  and  a  half 
per  cent  commission  is  charged  for  that,  besides  two  and 
a  half  for  doing  the  business,  and  two  and  a  half  per  cent 
for  remittance  to  the  United  States,  making  ten  per  cent, 
at  least,  on  the  whole  transaction  of  charter  and  sale.  The 
master  of  the  vessel  is  ordered  and  authorized  to  take,  in 
case  it  be  offered,  the  sum  already  bargained  and  guar 
anteed  to  begin  here  ;  and  the  agent  of  the  slave-trading 
purchaser  in  Africa  is  written  to,  and  ordered  by  him  to 
offer  and  give  the  sum  already  agreed  upon  and  partly 
paid  here  ;  the  vessel  is  loaded  with  English  goods,  4  fit 
for  the  coast,'  i.e.  with  goods  which  are  the  medium  of 
exchange  there  for  slaves,  money  not  being  used  or  known 
there,  and  with  Brazilian  provisions  of  jerked  beef,  black 
beans,  farina,  and  cachaca,  and  sometimes  with  bar  and 
hoop  iron  and  with  powder  and  muskets ;  and  there  is 
another  vessel  chartered  in  like  manner  already  there,  or 
going,  or  gone,  or  soon  to  go,  with  a  like  cargo  to  make 
slave-trade  funds,  and  to  supply  the  slave-trade  employees, 
and,  according  to  her  charter  party  and  a  private  under 
standing  with  the  first  vessel,  to  bring  back  as  'passen- 
gersj  the  American  crew  of  the  first  vessel  at  the  cost  of 
the  charterer ;  and  the  first  is  sold  and  delivered ;  and  the 
American  master  and  crew  have  very  particular  written  in 
structions  by  some  business  friend  here  how  far  to  go 
exactly  in  order  to  evade  the  laws  of  the  United  States ; 
to  take  off  the  flag,  the  name  on  the  stern  and  the  vessel's 


THE   SLAVE-TRADE  113 

papers,  and  to  exercise  no  act  of  ownership,  and  to  give  no 
aid  or  assistance  after  sale  and  delivery,  and  neither  before 
nor  after  to  aid  or  abet  the  slave-trade  in  any  way.  In 
most  cases  these  instructions  are  very  scrupulously  fol 
lowed  ;  and  in  from  two  to  seven  hours  after  the  vessel  is 
sold  and  delivered,  she  is  loaded  to  suffocation  with  hun 
dreds  of  miserable  captives  already  on  the  beach  in 
shackles,  who  are  berthed  on  water-pipes,  laid  level  fore 
and  aft,  covered  with  rush  mats  ;  and  instantly  she  sails 
for  the  first  port  she  can  reach  in  safety  on  the  coast  of 
Brazil ;  and  her  American  master  and  crew  are  transferred 
to  the  second  vessel,  which,  during  the  time  of  waiting,  is 
employed,  perhaps,  in  transporting  and  carrying  supplies 
along  the  coast  from  slave  factory  to  factory,  from  Cabinda 
to  Congo,  and  Congo  to  Cabinda,  and  which,  as  soon  as 
she  gets  her  returning  passengers  who  have  carried  a  vessel 
over  directly  to  the  slaves  and  carried  the  slaves  them 
selves  over,  returns,  perhaps,  with  a  lawful  cargo  of  wax, 
ivory,  etc.,  which  has  been  brought  from  the  interior  to 
the  coast  of  Africa  on  the  heads  of  the  very  captives  which 
her  consort  has  just  sailed  with  to  the  first  port  in  Brazil. 
.  .  .  And,  in  conclusion,  if  the  question  be  repeated,  as 
it  has  been  asked,  why  I,  an  American  slaveholder,  mani 
fest  such  extraordinary  zeal  on  this  subject,  the  only  an 
swer  I  shall  deign  to  give  is,  that  the  fact  of  my  being  a 
slaveholder  is  itself  a  pledge  and  guarantee  that  I  am  no 
fanatic,  foolishly  and  wickedly  bent  upon  running  amuck 
against  any  lawful  property  or  trade  ;  and  that  I  find  the 
same  old  interest  at  work  here  and  now,  to  fasten  African 
slavery  upon  Brazil,  which  in  our  early  history  fastened 
the  condition  of  a  slave  state  on  Virginia.  Vessels  and 
capital  from  precisely  the  same  quarters  bring  the  slaves 
to  this  country  in  this  age,  which  carried  them  to  that 
country  in  times  past.  The  very  lands  in  the  Old  and  in 


114  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

the  New  World,  where  world's  conventions  are  held,  and 
where  abolition  petitions  flow,  are  the  lands  where  there 
are  manufacturers  of  '  goods  fit  for  the  coast,'  and  where 
there  are  owners  of  vessels  to  be  'chartered  and  sold 
deliverable  on  the  coast  of  Africa,  who  will  not  eat  slave 
sugar  !  '  .  .  .  Our  whole  country,  with  a  few  exceptions 
in  every  part  alike,  perhaps,  would  have  me,  I  am  confident, 
exert  every  energy,  in  my  station,  to  suppress  the  African 
slave-trade  carried  on  by  our  citizens.  The  courts  and 
the  whole  country  of  the  United  States,  I  am  sure,  slave- 
holding  and  non-slaveholding,  will  incline  in  favor  of  the 
law  and  against  the  evils  of  this  trade.  No  officer  need  to 
fear,  therefore,  that  he  will  not  be  sustained  by  both  pub 
lic  law  and  public  opinion  at  home,  in  the  faithful  and 
zealous  discharge  of  his  duty  in  this  behalf.  Without 
making  any  superfluous  professions  of  proper  motives, 
there  is  one  sentiment  alone  which  is  sufficient  to  inspire 
me  with  ardor  in  the  course  I  have  pursued  and  will  pur 
sue.  I  love  the  flag,  under  which  my  country  has  won  its 
national  independence  and  its  national  respectability,  and 
with  which  it  protects  our  persons  and  property,  too  well 
to  sit  still,  or  to  sit  silent,  and  see  its  4  blessed  bunting ' 
openly  or  secretly  chartered  or  sold  for  the  uses  of  an 
infamous  trade,  as  fine  linen  is  bought  and  sold  for  the 
uses  of  prostitution.  No  !  Gentlemen,  I  had  often  looked 
at  it  when  waving  4  over  the  land  of  the  free  and  the  home 
of  the  brave,'  or  when  floating  over  the  decks  of  the  4  old 
Constitution?  with  feelings  too  near  akin  to  adoration,  but 
until  I  left  the  shores  of  my  native  land,  until  I  saw  it 
when  far  off  from  home  and  country,  in  the  '  dim  dis 
tance  '  at  sea,  or  waving  a  welcome  from  the  flag-staff  of 
a  United  States  Consulate  in  the  Western  Islands  of  the 
Atlantic,  I  never  understood,  or  fully  comprehended  its 
symbol  —  the  essence  of  which  it  is  the  type  —  until  then 


THE   SLAVE-TRADE  115 

I  never  realized  the  substance  and  the  value  that  there  is 
in  it.  ...  Is  that  flag  to  be  struck  not  to  an  enemy,  but 
to  the  slave-trade  ?  Is  it  ever  placed  where  it  dare  not  be 
seen  ?  Has  it  to  be  hauled  down  for  the  foreigner  ?  Has 
it  to  hide  its  4  stars  and  stripes '  in  order  to  evade  the 
laws  of  its  country,  of  itself  ?  Is  it  bought  and  sold  for  a 
price  of  infamy,  which  should  turn  it  the  true  color  of  the 
pirate's  flag,  blood-red  all  over  with  the  blushes  of  shame  ? 
Gentlemen,  I  could  never  look  at  it  again  hoisted  over  a 
man-of-war,  without  having  tried  my  uttermost  to  rescue 
it  from  this  degradation.  I  could  never  again  hear  the 
anecdote,  with  patriotic  pride,  that  when  one  Brazilian 
slave  asks  another,  4  which  of  all  the  national  ships  lying 
here  the  English  are  most  afraid  of  ? '  they  reply  invari 
ably,  '  Americanos,'  and  that  they  never  think  of  matching 
a  United  States  frigate,  in  their  comparison,  against  less 
than  an  English  seventy-four,  without  feeling  that  this 
impression  upon  the  very  slaves  of  Brazil  is  derived  from 
the  safe  protection  which  our  flag  gives  to  the  African 
trade  against  British  cruisers." 

In  another  letter,  dated  March,  1846,  in  describing  the 
connection  of  the  navigation  interest  of  the  Northern  sea 
board  cities  with  the  slave-trade,  he  wrote :  "  Out  of 
twenty-two  vessels  of  our  merchant  marine  engaged  in 
the  African  trade  between  the  coast  and  Brazil  since 
June,  1845,  but  four  hailed  south  of  Philadelphia,  and 
they  were  from  Baltimore." 

Hon.  Hamilton  Hamilton,  the  British  minister  to  the 
Court  of  Brazil  during  the  time  of  Wise's  residence  there, 
was  also  active  in  bringing  the  facts  connected  with  the 
slave-trade  to  the  attention  of  Parliament,  and  hearty  co 
operation  existed  between  the  two  ministers  on  this  sub 
ject.  In  March,  1845,  Hamilton  wrote  Wise  as  follows: 
"  The  zeal  and  activity  you  employ  so  unremittingly  to 


116  THE    LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

detect  and  frustrate  the  nefarious  practices  of  the  slave 
merchants  cannot  fail  to  produce  good  fruit  hereafter; 
and  in  the  meantime  to  obtain  for  you,  as  you  richly 
merit,  not  only  the  approval  of  your  own  government, 
but  the  gratitude  of  England,  and  of  all  other  nations 
embarked  in  the  great  cause  of  humanity."  The  doom 
of  the  traffic  was  then  fast  approaching,  and  in  1853  it 
was  discontinued. 

During  his  residence  at  Rio  Wise  familiarized  himself 
with  the  fauna  and  flora  of  the  country,  and  was  greatly 
impressed  with  the  physical  possibilities  of  Brazil,  though 
he  found  the  climate  enervating,  and  evidently  was  not 
imbued  with  the  idea  that  the  natural  advantages  of  that 
country  are  superior  to  our  own. 

In  a  letter  to  a  friend  at  home,  in  regard  to  the  ship 
ment  of  plants  and  fruits  for  transplanting  here,  he  wrote : 
"  I  must  say  that  I  think  our  temperate  zone  already  far 
surpasses,  in  vegetable  luxuries,  any  tropical  climes  which 
I  have  yet  seen.  Much,  for  commerce  and  luxury  both, 
might  be  introduced  into  our  extreme  Southern  country 
from  Brazil.  Why  not  coffee,  tapioca,  mandioca,  the 
great  varieties  of  fruits,  and  particularly  the  dyewoods, 
the  cabinet-woods,  and  the  innumerable  silk  and  manila 
grasses  for  bagging  and  ropes?  A  Brazilian  friend  has 
promised  to  furnish  me  with  the  seeds  of  the  jacaranda 
tree  —  that  beautiful,  black,  ebony-like  wood  which  so  far 
surpasses,  in  my  taste,  the  mahogany,  The  nuga  tree, 
also  of  this  country,  might  be  introduced.  It  is  a  beauti 
ful  shade  tree,  grows  as  large  as  our  hickory,  and  bears  a 
nut  very  similar,  but  larger,  which  is  used  to  make,  it  is 
said,  the  best  painter's  oils.  It  resembles  the  hickory  in 
the  bark,  and  the  sycamore  in  the  leaf.  The  truth  is,  one 
is  confounded  by  the  question  what  plants  to  send  home, 
such  are  their  numbers,  varieties,  uses,  and  beauties,  and 


GENERAL   SHERMAN'S   VISIT  117 

the  doubts  respecting  their  standing  our  climate.  I  send 
you  a  small  parcel  of  some  species  of  acacia.  The  small 
pods  are  a  beautiful  flower,  and  the  large  red  seeds  are 
of  a  tree  like  the  locust." 

Apropos  of  Wise's  life  at  Rio,  we  may  be  pardoned  the 
introduction  of  an  anecdote  in  relation  to  it.  While  resid 
ing  there,  his  family  received  two  new  additions,  a  son 
and  a  daughter.  The  former,  John  S.  Wise,  now  a  lawyer 
in  New  York  City,  a  few  years  since  met  General  Sherman 
at  an  entertainment  in  New  York,  and  the  two  soon  en 
gaged  in  conversation.  The  talk  turned  upon  the  subject 
of  the  latter's  visit  to  Rio,  when  a  young  officer,  and  his 
meeting  with  the  American  minister.  "  Yes,"  said  the 
General,  "  I  met  your  father  upon  one  occasion,  and  that 
was  in  December  of  1846 ;  Halleck  and  I  were  lieutenants, 
and  had  been  ordered  around  to  California  by  way  of  the 
Horn.  We  had  a  splendid  trip  of  it;  made  a  stop  in 
Brazil,  at  Rio  Janeiro.  Your  father  was  minister  at  that 
time.  Halleck  and  I  climbed  Sugar  Loaf  Mountain,  near 
there,  and  on  our  way  up  we  met  two  gentlemen  coming 
down.  They  were  attired  as  Americans,  and  we  heard 
that  they  spoke  English.  One  of  them  wore  the  shoulder- 
straps  of  a  surgeon  in  the  United  States  navy.  He  proved 
to  be  young  Dr.  Garnett,  who  afterward  married  your 
sister.  Halleck  and  I  introduced  ourselves,  and  were  cor 
dially  welcomed ;  the  other  gentleman  was  your  father, 
the  United  States  minister  to  Brazil.  I  remember  that 
both  gentlemen  were  exceedingly  courteous;  that  they 
showed  us  every  attention.  I  recall  all  as  clearly  as  if  it 
had  happened  yesterday,  yet  this  was  in  1846.  It  was  the 
day  after  Christmas.  We  dined  with  your  father  and 
Dr.  Garnett,  and  spent  the  evening  with  them,  and  met 
your  sister.  When  we  bade  them  good-by  at  ten  o'clock 
that  night,  and  went  back  to  the  boat,  Halleck  and  I 


118  THE    LIFE    OF    HENRY    A.    WISE 

agreed  that  we  had  never  met  more  charming  friends." 
"Did  you  meet  my  mother?"  asked  Mr.  Wise.  "No," 
answered  General  Sherman ;  "  we  did  not  have  that  pleas 
ure  ;  we  were  told  she  was  indisposed."  "  You  didn't  see 
me  either  ?  "  asked  Mr.  Wise.  "  No,  not  that  I  recall," 
replied  the  General.  "  Well,  mother  was  slightly  indis 
posed  that  evening,"  said  Mr.  Wise.  "  If  you  had  not  left 
the  house  at  ten  o'clock  that  night,  if  you  had  stayed  four 
hours  later,  you  would  have  seen  me.  I  was  born  at  two 
o'clock  in  the  morning  of  December  27,  1846." 

It  is  related  by  John  Quincy  Adams  in  his  diary  that, 
when  James  Monroe  asked  Jefferson  as  to  the  advisability 
of  the  former's  appointing  Andrew  Jackson  minister  to 
Russia,  Jefferson  replied,  "Why,  good  God,  he  would 
breed  you  a  quarrel  before  he  had  been  there  a  month !  " 
Fortunately,  Wise  did  not  involve  his  government  in 
serious  complications  with  Brazil,  but  his  impulsive 
nature  and  disregard  of  diplomatic  methods  rendered 
him  somewhat  dangerous  in  the  capacity  of  a  foreign 
minister,  as  it  was  by  no  means  certain  what  hasty  ac 
tion  he  might  take  at  any  time. 

During  the  month  of  October,  1846,  a  party  of  Ameri 
can  sailors,  belonging  to  the  warship  Columbia,  became 
engaged  in  a  fisticuff  alongshore,  and  they  were  arrested 
by  the  local  police,  along  with  Lieutenant  Davis  of  the 
United  States  navy,  who  was  endeavoring  to  separate 
them.  They  were  roughly  handled  and  incarcerated  in 
the  Imperial  prison.  Wise,  as  the  representative  of  the 
United  States  government,  promptly  demanded  their 
release,  which  was  finally  acceded  to,  although  at  first  the 
Brazilian  authorities  were  only  disposed  to  grant  it  on 
terms  humiliating  to  Lieutenant  Davis,  and  which  were 
declined  by  him.  The  affair  led  to  strained  relations  be 
tween  Wise  and  the  Court,  and  while  he  was  awaiting 


RETURN   TO   THE    UNITED   STATES  119 

further  instructions  from  Washington,  the  Emperor's 
birthday  was  celebrated.  Upon  this  occasion,  through 
some  oversight,  Commodore  Rousseau  of  the  American 
navy,  who  was  aboard  the  Columbia  lying  in  the  harbor, 
failed  to  salute  with  his  guns,  which  neglect,  or  breach  of 
etiquette,  was  erroneously  attributed  by  the  Court  to 
Wise's  influence.  When  a  short  while  after,  the  Depart 
ment  of  State  at  Washington  transmitted  through  Wise  a 
letter  tendering  congratulations,  upon  the  birth  of  the 
Princess  Isabel,  the  Emperor  declined  to  grant  an  audience 
for  that  purpose,  to  such  an  extent  had  the  breach  widened. 
Wise's  conduct  in  the  affair  of  Lieutenant  Davis,  though 
somewhat  intemperate  perhaps,  received  the  indorsement 
of  President  Polk  and  Secretary  Buchanan,  and  they  posi 
tively  refused  to  recall  him,  in  response  to  a  request  from 
Lisbon,  the  Brazilian  minister  at  Washington,  which  was 
made  at  the  instance  of  his  government.  It  was  obvious, 
however,  that  Wise's  stay  at  Rio  could  no  longer  be  fruit 
ful  of  good  results,  under  the  circumstances,  he  believing 
that  the  interest  of  those  high  at  Court  in  the  slave-trade 
was  at  the  bottom  of  the  feeling  manifested  toward  him. 
In  the  spring  of  1847,  he  wrote  to  Washington,  requesting" 
his  recall,  which  was  granted,  and  David  Tod  of  Ohio, 
was  appointed  to  succeed  him.  Upon  the  arrival  of  the 
latter  at  Rio,  about  August  1,  1847,  Wise  took  passage 
on  the  Columbia  for  the  United  States,  where  he  landed 
safe  during  the  month  of  October.  A  few  days  later  he 
reported  at  Washington ;  and  then  returned  to  his  home 
in  Accomack,  where  a  cordial  greeting  awaited  him  by  his 
neighbors,  who  received  him  at  the  wharf,  with  cannon 
booming,  followed  by  a  welcome  from  a  spokesman  chosen 
from  their  number. 


CHAPTER  IX 

WISE'S    HOME    ON    ONANCOCK    CREEK.       RESUMES     THE     PRACTICE 
OF    LAW.       ANECDOTES    OF    HIS    CAREER 

SHORTLY  after  his  return  to  his  native  country,  Wise 
made  his  residence  at  a  farm  which  he  had  purchased  on 
Onancock  Creek,  near  the  village  of  that  name.  Here  he 
erected  a  plain  but  substantial  frame  dwelling  and  gave 
to  the  place  the  name  of  "Only,"  after  a  former  owner 
of  the  land.  The  location  of  the  house  is  singularly 
beautiful.  Onancock  Creek,  which  at  this  point  is  very 
wide,  comes  down  from  its  source,  and,  in  a  bend  of 
the  stream,  is  situated  a  grove  of  sturdy  oaks,  in  a  yard 
largely  surrounded  by  water.  Embowered  among  these 
trees  and  but  a  few  miles  distant  from  the  Chesapeake, 
into  which  the  creek  empties,  was  the  "  Only"  mansion. 

Wise  again  resumed  the  practice  of  his  profession,  which 
he  had  long  neglected,  and  in  a  short  while  was  in  the 
enjoyment  of  a  fairly  lucrative  income  from  that  source,  as 
such  things  were  measured  in  the  country  in  Virginia. 
He  declared  it  to  be  his  intention  to  abandon  politics,  but. 
in  1848,  the  year  after  his  return  from  Brazil,  he  was  nomi 
nated  as  an  elector  from  his  district,  on  the  Cass  and 
Butler  Democratic  ticket,  and  was  on  the  hustings  advocat 
ing  the  election  of  the  party  nominees. 

But  for  the  next  few  years,  he  devoted  his  best  ener 
gies  to  the  law,  and  his  readiness  in  speech  and  gifts  of 
oratory  gave  him  great  power  before  the  jury,  especially 

120 


LAW   PRACTICE   IN  ACCOMACK  121 

in  criminal  trials.  An  instance  of  his  keen  knowledge  of 
human  nature  and  fertility  of  resource  was  furnished  in 
the  case  of  a  slave  who  was  tried  for  robbery  in  the 
county  of  Accomack.  A  Mrs.  Bagwell,  while  alone  at 
home  on  her  plantation,  after  nightfall,  was  approached, 
while  seated  in  her  chamber,  by  several  negro  men,  who 
stealthily  crept  into  the  house,  and  seizing  her  from  be 
hind,  choked  her  and  threatened  her  life,  in  order  to 
extort  money  and  other  valuables.  She  told  them  where 
her  money  was  kept,  and  in  addition  to  this  they  took 
some  meat  which  they  hurriedly  wrapped  in  sheets.  In 
taking  out  the  linen  from  a  chest  of  drawers,  where  they 
thought  more  money  was  concealed,  a  paper  containing 
vermilion  was  accidentally  torn  open  and  its  contents  scat 
tered  through  the  sheets.  While  making  their  way  from 
the  house,  through  the  woods,  the  men  heard  footsteps,  and 
in  their  flight  dropped  the  bundle  near  the  cabin  of  a  negro 
named  Jacob.  The  news  of  the  robbery  rapidly  spread 
throughout  the  neighborhood,  and  searching  parties  were 
quickly  organized.  Jacob  in  the  meantime  had  found  the 
bundle  of  linen  near  his  cabin,  and  in  a  moment  of  fear 
lest  he  should  be  suspected,  dug  a  hole  in  the  ground, 
buried  part  of  the  linen  and  meat,  and  sewed  the  remainder 
up  in  his  bedtick.  His  cabin  was  shortly  after  visited 
and  a  search  begun,  with  the  result  that  the  articles  were 
found,  hidden  as  described.  The  sheets  upon  being  com 
pared  with  those  at  Mrs.  Bagwell's  house  were  found  to 
exactly  correspond  in  texture,  and  the  marks  of  the  scat 
tered  vermilion  powder  left  no  doubt  as  to  their  identity. 
The  case  was  to  all  appearances  a  very  strong  one  against 
Jacob,  and  the  circumstantial  evidence  seemed  to  furnish 
irresistible  proof  of  his  guilt.  Wise  was  employed  to 
defend  him,  which  was  apparently  a  hopeless  undertaking, 
as  in  addition  to  the  circumstances  previously  narrated,  a 


122  THE   LIFE    OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

negro  testified  that  he  had  seen  him,  in  company  with  sev 
eral  other  men,  enter  Mrs.  Bagwell's  house  at  the  time  of 
the  robbery.  Mrs.  Bagwell,  though  she  had  been  blind 
folded,  was  partially  able  to  identify  two  of  the  men,  by 
the  sound  of  their  voices,  but  could  give  no  clew  to  the 
identity  of  the  third.  These  two,  as  well  as  Jacob,  were 
convicted,  and  the  former  sentenced  to  be  hung.  During 
the  progress  of  the  trial,  Wise  had  become  convinced  of 
the  innocence  of  his  client,  and  his  attention  had  been 
attracted  by  the  peculiar  demeanor  of  a  negro  seen  about 
the  court-house,  who  excited  his  suspicions  to  such  a 
degree,  that  he  believed  him  to  be  the  guilty  party. 
Before  the  sentence  was  passed  upon  his  client,  he  arose 
to  make  a  motion  to  set  aside  the  verdict,  and,  after  a  brief 
address,  astonished  the  court  by  asserting  that  not  only 
was  his  client  innocent,  but  that  the  guilty  man  was  in 
the  court  room.  During  the  delivery  of  his  speech,  he  had 
watched  the  effect  on  the  negro,  shown  by  his  horror- 
stricken  countenance,  as  the  details  of  the  crime  were 
vividly  described.  In  his  wonderfully  dramatic  way,  with 
his  piercing  eye  fastened  upon  him,  Wise  with  uplifted 
arm  pointed  out  the  culprit,  seated  in  the  gallery,  who, 
wild  with  fear,  arose  and  fled.  On  being  apprehended, 
he  confessed  his  guilt  and  testified  to  the  innocence  of 
Jacob,  whose  life  was  thus  saved. 

Many  stories  are  related  on  the  eastern  shore,  even  at 
the  present  day,  telling  of  Wise's  remarkable  triumphs 
before  juries  and  on  the  hustings ;  and  numbers  of  anec 
dotes  illustrating  his  ready  wit  and  love  of  fun.  Among 
the  latter  is  the  following,  which  was  related  to  the  au 
thor  by  a  resident  of  the  peninsula.  Just  off  the  coast  of 
Accomack  on  the  Atlantic  side  of  the  peninsula,  near  the 
Maryland  boundary  line,  lies  Chincoteague  Island,  which 
was  formerly  inhabited  by  a  primitive,  but  shrewd  class  of 


A   CAMP-MEETING   DISCOURSE  123 

fishermen  and  cattle  and  pony  breeders.  The  annual 
pony  pennings  on  the  island,  during  the  month  of  August 
in  each  year,  when  the  wild  animals  were  caught  and 
branded,  attracted  hundreds  of  people,  while  sportsmen 
sought  the  island  at  all  seasons,  for  the  hunting  and  fish 
ing.  Upon  one  occasion,  a  Baptist  revival  meeting  had 
been  in  progress  for  several  weeks,  and  religious  excite 
ment  ran  high.  One  evening  Wise  and  a  half  dozen  con 
vivial  spirits,  who  had  just  reached  the  island  for  a  few 
days'  relaxation,  came  up.  Several  of  the  party,  as  the 
story  goes,  had  been  imbibing  freely.  No  sooner  were 
the  group  seated  on  the  rough,  improvised  benches,  than 
the  preacher,  a  "  hard-shell "  of  the  most  severe  type,  dis 
covered  their  presence  and,  as  Wise  wore  a  serious  coun 
tenance  and  was  of  a  somewhat  clerical  appearance,  called 
upon  the  unknown  brother  to  exhort.  Without  a  mo 
ment's  hesitation,  to  the  astonishment  and  infinite  amuse 
ment  of  his  comrades,  who  were  not  so  far  gone  as  to  be 
oblivious  of  the  humorous  situation,  Wise  proceeded  to 
the  front  of  the  large  assembly.  Taking  for  his  text 
"  wine  is  a  mocker,  strong  drink  is  raging,  and  he  that  is 
deceived  thereby  is  not  Wise  "  —  he  talked  eloquently  and 
to  such  purpose,  that  a  number  of  conversions  followed 
the  exhortation,  while  the  guilty  young  men  from  the 
mainland,  to  whom  the  talk  was  really  addressed,  were 
almost  choking  with  suppressed  merriment.  Ascertaining 
Wise's  identity  afterward,  the  "hard-shell"  divine  was 
ever  wont  to  mention  him  as  a  worker  in  the  vineyard  and 
a  good  Baptist. 

For  the  following  anecdotes  of  Wise,  which  were  re 
cently  published  in  the  Richmond  Times,  we  are  indebted 
to  the  pen  of  the  Rev.  J.  R.  Sturgis.  "  One  summer, 
during  the  progress  of  a  camp-meeting  on  the  famous 
Tangier  beach,  a  Mr. ,  from  the  '  Mainland,'  disturbed 


124  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

the  worshippers  and  almost  broke  up  the  meeting.  The 
managers  determined  to  prosecute  the  offender.  His  con 
viction  was  a  certainty  and  everybody  predicted  that  it 
would  be  exceedingly  hard  with  him ;  that  the  law  would 
and  ought  to  bear  heavily  upon  him. 

"In  due  time  the  case  was  called  and  the  trial  pro 
ceeded.  Joint  testimony  of  credible  witnesses  established 
the  prisoner's  guilt.  4  What  can  Wise  say  ?  What  can  he 
do  ? '  men  were  asking. 

"  When  Mr.  Wise  arose  in  defence  of  his  client,  he  as 
tonished  many  by  admitting  the  fact  of  his  client's  guilt, 
as  claimed  by  the  prosecution.  He  even  lectured  the  pris 
oner,  incidentally,  on  his  bad  behavior  in  drinking  and 
then  disturbing  the  worship  of  Almighty  God.  Then 
turning  from  the  prisoner  to  the  church,  as  represented  by 
the  prosecuting  ministers  and  managers,  he  denounced  the 
spirit  and  fact  of  the  prosecution,  as  being  opposed  to  the 
spirit  and  teachings  of  the  Christ  they  professed  to  rep 
resent.  Calling  for  a  Bible  and  turning  its  pages,  he 
paused,  and  then  read  Matthew  xxii:  'Render  therefore 
unto  Csesar  the  things  which  are  Caesar's ;  and  unto  God 
the  things  which  are  God's.' 

"  Taking  this  as  his  text,  he  preached  his  sermon.  Be 
fore  he  concluded  it  —  long  before — the  jury  was  con 
vinced  that  the  prosecution  was  a  persecution  and  the 
church  the  real  sinner  instead  of  the  poor  persecuted  pris 
oner  at  the  bar.  Without  going  out  of  the  room  to  delib 
erate,  the  jury  acquitted  the  man,  and  the  heavy  costs 
thrown  upon  the  church  amounted  to  hundreds  of  dollars. 

"  It  is  plain  that  these  jurymen  deliberated  upon  ques 
tions  of  sin,  which  they  had  no  right  to  consider,  and 
ignored  totally  the  question  of  crime,  the  very  and  only 
question  they  were  empanelled  to  consider.  But  do  not 
make  the  mistake  of  supposing  that  this  was  owing  to  the 


CHARACTERISTIC    ANECDOTES  125 

ignorance  or  obtuseness  of  these  jurors.  The  witchery  of 
Wise's  words  often  blinded,  not  only  a  jury,  but  also  all 
who  heard  him,  to  everything  in  the  case,  except  what  he 
wished  them  to  see. 

"  One  side  of  his  nature  was  rarely,  if  ever,  revealed  to 
the  public,  but  glimpses  of  a  spirit  delightfully  chivalrous 
were  occasionally  caught  by  a  few  beholders.  Two  in 
stances  will  illustrate  this :  Mr.  Thomas  Crockett,  of  Tan 
gier  Island,  is  now  growing  "gray.  During  Mr.  Crockett's 
boyhood,  one  bright  Sabbath  morning,  Mr.  Wise  unex 
pectedly  appeared  at  the  home  of  this  Crockett  family. 
All  its  members  were  at  church  with  the  exception  of  the 
boy  '  Tom.'  Mr.  Wise  refused  him  the  exciting  privilege 
of  running  to  the  church  to  inform  his  parents  of  the  dis 
tinguished  guest  awaiting  their  coming,  remarking,  'If 
your  folks  knew  I  were  here  they  would  either  leave 
the  meeting  or  could  not  enjoy  it.'  In  due  time,  however, 
his  mother  returned,  and  appeared  considerably  'frus 
trated  '  at  the  sight  of  her  guest,  so  much  so  that  when 
they  sat  down  to  dinner  it  required  several  attempts 
before  her  trembling  hands  could  pour  the  coffee.  As  for 
speech,  at  the  sight  of  Mr.  Wise  her  voice  had  fled,  and 
every  attempt  to  speak  had  only  increased  her  embar 
rassment.  Suddenly  to  the  amazement  of  the  observant 
and  sympathetic  Tom,  the  cloud  of  fear  and  anxiety 
passed  from  his  mother's  face,  and  she  became  her  natural 
self.  In  smiling,  complacent  manner,  she  even  addressed 
some  remark  to  the  visitor,  whose  presence  hitherto  had 
upset  her.  Tom  registered  two  resolves:  To  ask  his 
mother  for  an  explanation  of  this  wonderful  change  in 
her,  and  to  ask  Mr.  Wise  concerning  a  breach  of  'table 
manners,'  that  their  guest  was  guilty  of,  according  to  the 
island  standard.  Strolling  out  with  Mr.  Wise,  he  put  his 
burning  question.  '  Mr.  Wise,  why  did  you  take  that 


126  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY    A.   WISE 

piece  of  biled  chicken  in  your  fingers  and  bite  mouthfuls 
off  in  that  way,  instead  of  using  your  knife  and  fork? 
My  mar  makes  me  use  a  knife  and  fork  when  I  eat  biled 
chicken,  and  she  says  that's  the  right  way  to  eat  it.  You 
ought  to  know  what  is  the  right  way,  Mr.  Wise,  and  you 
eat  it  with  your  fingers.  Now,  is  mar  wrong  and  you 
right?' 

" '  No,  my  boy,  your  mother's  right  and  I  was  wrong ;  I 
never  ate  chicken  that  way  before,'  said  Mr.  Wise.  '  I 
had  a  reason  for  eating  it  that  way.  Did  you  notice  how 
embarrassed  your  mother  seemed  to  be  ? ' 

" '  I  knew  she  was  skeered  nighly  to  death,'  said  Tom. 

" '  And  did  you  see  that  her  fear  left  her  all  at  once  ? ' 
said  Mr.  Wise. 

"  4  Yes,  sir,'  responded  Tom. 

" '  Well,  it  was  the  way  I  ate  the  chicken,  my  boy,  that 
made  your  mother  feel  at  ease  in  my  presence.  She  felt 
that  she  could  teach  me  one  thing  if  she  was  an  islander, 
for  I  evidently  didn't  know  how  to  eat  decently ;  and  the 
moment  she  first  felt  that  she  was  above  me  in  this  respect, 
that  moment  her  fear  left  her.' 

"  Perhaps  it  was  the  friendly  interest  shown  Tom  Crock 
ett  by  Mr.  Wise,  then  and  afterward,  that  made  him,  with 
perhaps  one  exception,  the  best  educated  and  most  intelli 
gent  man  of  his  island  generation. 

"  On  his  way  to  or  from  a  Maryland  court,  Mr.  Wise 
was  once  spending  the  day  with  a  friend,  not  far  from 
what  afterward  became  Crisfield,  although  the  town  and 
a  railroad  were  not  then  even  dreamed  of.  While  there 
he  accompanied  his  host  to  the  sale  of  a  deceased  man's 
personal  estate.  Among  the  effects  was  a  large  bowl  — 
the  old-time  punch  or  egg-nog  bowl.  It  was  full  of  sugar 
belonging  to  the  widow.  Not  thinking  that  the  bowl 
would  be  'put  up'  so  soon,  she  left  the  room  to  get  a 


CHARACTERISTIC   ANECDOTES  127 

bucket  in  which  to  empty  the  sugar.  A  friend  soon  ran 
after  her  to  tell  her  that  they  were  selling  the  bowl,  with 
her  sugar  in  it.  The  widow  hastened  back  to  stop  the 
sale  of  the  bowl  until  she  could  empty  it.  It  was  '  knocked 
down '  to  a  party  just  as  she  entered  the  room.  It  was  in 
vain  that  she  explained  to  the  purchaser.  He  refused  to 
give  up  the  sugar  and  allow  the  bowl  to  be  resold.  Stung 
by  the  indignant  looks  and  remarks  of  the  crowd,  he 
openly  appealed  to  Mr.  Wise,  whom  he  knew  by  sight: 

" 4  Mr.  Wise,  you  are  a  lawyer  and  know  whether  I  am 
right  or  not.  I  ask  you  in  the  presence  of  these  people, 
am  I  entitled  to  the  sugar  in  this  bowl,  or  not  ?  If  you 
say  I  am  not,  I  will  give  it  back  to  her.  If  you  say  I  am 
entitled  to  it,  then  I  shall  keep  it.' 

"4My  friend,'  said  Mr.  Wise,  in  his  gentlest  tone,  and 
with  a  deprecating  manner,  4you  put  a  delicate  and  an 
unpleasant  responsibility  upon  me.  Hadn't  you  better 
decide  this  yourself  ?  ' 

" '  No,'  said  the  buyer,  '  I  know  what  your  opinion  is 
going  to  be,  and  I  want  you  to  give  it  so  this  whole  crowd 
can  hear  it.' 

" '  Then,'  said  Mr.  Wise,  '  I  advise  you  that  the  sugar 
is  yours.  The  widow  cannot  take  it  from  you.  She  has 
no  redress  in  the  matter.' 

"  At  this  point  the  man  cried  out,  4  What  did  I  tell 
you! ' 

"  '  Stop ! '  thundered  Mr.  Wise.  4  I've  given  you  my 
opinion  ;  I've  advised  you,  at  your  persistent  request,  as 
I  can  prove  by  all  these  people.  It  remains  for  me  to 
tell  you  that  I  charge  you  five  dollars  for  the  advice  and 
my  service  in  the  matter,  and  I  demand  immediate  pay 
ment.  If  you  trifle  with  me  a  moment  in  the  matter  of 
payment,  it  will  be  the  dearest  bargain  of  your  life.' 

"  As  Mr.  Wise  concluded,  he  walked  to  the  crestfallen 


128  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.    WISE 

individual  and  extended  his  hand  for  the  money,  while 
the  crowd  yelled  its  approval.  But  the  crowd  became 
suddenly  silent,  as  Mr.  Wise  walked  over  to  the  widow, 
and  placing  the  five  dollars  in  her  hand,  said :  '  Madam, 
this  money  is  honestly  mine.  I  have  a  perfect  right  to 
dispose  of  it  as  I  please.  Take  it  and  with  it  buy  more 
sugar  for  yourself  and  your  fatherless  children.' " 

The  Times,  in  adverting  to  the  subject  of  the  legal 
advice  above  related,  said :  "  Is  it  certain  that  Governor 
Wise  decided  the  point  of  law  correctly  ?  Portia's  judg 
ment,  in  which  she  decided  that  the  pound  of  flesh  carried 
no  blood,  may  be  cited  to  the  contrary,  though  the  late 
William  Green  of  Richmond,  one  of  the  most  learned  law 
yers  the  world  ever  saw,  always  questioned  the  correctness 
of  that,  upon  the  ground  that  a  grant  necessarily  carries 
with  it  all  of  its  incidents. 

"  No  legal  reasoning,  however,  can  impair  the  effect  of 
the  admirable  story  of  Governor  Wise  and  the  skinflint." 


CHAPTER   X 

THE  MOVEMENT  LEADING  TO  THE  VIRGINIA  CONSTITUTIONAL 
CONVENTION  OF  1850-51.  THE  MIXED  AND  WHITE  BASIS. 
WISE'S  PART  IN  THE  CONVENTION.  THE  STRUGGLE  FOR 
EQUALITY  OF  REPRESENTATION  IN  VIRGINIA 

THE  year  1850  witnessed  a  political  upheaval  in  Vir 
ginia,  which  had  long  been  brewing.  Probably  no  more 
radical  revolution,  of  a  peaceable  character,  has  ever  oc 
curred  in  this  country  than  that  which  culminated  in  the 
Virginia  Constitutional  Convention  of  1850-51. 

The  accession  of  Jefferson  and  his  followers  to  political 
power,  in  1776,  marked  a  great  democratic  triumph,  for 
the  abolition  of  the  laws  of  primogeniture  and  entails 
and  the  disestablishment  of  the  Church  quickly  followed. 
Simplicity  in  manners  and  in  dress  were  the  order  of  the 
day,  and  the  democratic  spirit  everywhere  prevailed.  As 
the  French  wines  were  substituted  for  English  ale,  so  the 
dress  of  the  colonial  period  gradually  gave  way  for  the 
pantaloons  of  our  own  day.  But  though  the  democratic 
leaven  was  at  work,  the  institution  of  negro  slavery  yet 
remained,  and  with  it,  of  necessity,  certain  survivals  of  a 
feudal  character. 

There  appears  to  be,  for  some  reason,  a  species  of  con 
flict  and  antagonism  in  every  country  between  highland 
and  lowland  peoples.  The  sharp  points  of  contrast  be 
tween  the  inhabitants  of  tidewater  Virginia  and  those 
residing  west  of  the  Appalachian  range  recalled  to  the 
K  129 


130  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

Rev.  Alexander  Campbell,  in  the  convention  of  1829,  the 
words  of  the  poet :  — 

"  Lands  intersected  by  a  narrow  frith 

Abhor  each  other.    Mountains  interposed 
Make  enemies  of  nations,  who  had  else, 

Like  kindred  drops,  been  mingled  into  one." 

From  the  time  of  the  Revolution  down  to  the  year  1850, 
the  breach  between  eastern  Virginia  and  the  transmontane 
section  had  steadily  widened  and  deepened.  In  soil, 
climate,  system  of  labor,  and  habits  of  the  people,  there 
were  wide  divergences  between  the  two  divisions  of  the 
State.  Slavery  existed  in  all  the  eastern  counties,  and 
the  slaveholding  interest  was  everywhere  dominant  in 
that  locality.  On  the  other  hand,  comparatively  few 
planters  had  carried  their  slaves  with  them  west  of  the 
Alleghanies,  and  in  the  transmontane  section  slavery  had 
gained  but  little  foothold. 

The  constitution  of  Virginia,  adopted  in  1776,  was  char 
acterized  by  an  inequality  of  apportionment  with  respect 
to  representation,  it  being  based  on  counties  or  districts 
and  not  population.  Jefferson  in  his  "  Notes  on  Virginia  " 
had  pointed  out  the  great  advantage  thus  gained  by  the 
tidewater  section.  From  time  to  time  the  popular  dis 
content  manifested  itself,  through  measures  introduced  in 
the  legislature,  providing  for  a  new  convention  to  revise 
the  constitution,  and  in  1784  Madison  strenuously  advo 
cated  such  action.  At  each  recurring  session  of  the  legis 
lature  the  question  was  debated,  until  finally  in  1816  the 
western  people  clamored  for  a  new  apportionment,  and 
met  in  convention  at  Staunton,  to  consider  what  steps  to 
take.  At  that  time,  one  white  man  in  eastern  Virginia 
"had  the  same  representation  in  the  Senate  as  three  men 
in  the  west."  In  1824,  Jefferson  published  a  letter  on  the 


THE  CONSTITUTIONAL   CONVENTION  131 

subject  in  the  Richmond  Enquirer ',  in  which  he  said: 
"  The  exclusion  of  a  majority  of  our  freemen  from  the 
right  of  representation  is  merely  arbitrary,  and  an  assump 
tion  of  the  minority  over  the  majority.  ...  In  the  repre 
sentative  privilege  the  equality  of  political  rights  is  entirely 
prostrated  by  our  constitution.  Upon  what  principle  of 
right  or  reason  can  any  one  justify  the  giving  to  every 
citizen  of  Warwick  as  much  weight  in  the  government  as 
to  twenty-two  citizens  in  Loudoun  ?  " 

Tidewater  Virginia  was  at  that  time  an  unprogressive 
community,  with  little  influx  of  new  population,  while  the 
steady  growth  of  the  mountain  region  further  increased 
the  inequality  in  representation. 

It  was  not  until  October,  1829,  that  the  State  Constitu 
tional  Convention,  which  had  been  petitioned  and  fought 
for  over  a  period  of  fifty  years,  at  last  assembled  in  ses 
sion  in  Richmond.  As  has  often  been  remarked,  perhaps 
no  State  convention  ever  assembled  in  America  contain 
ing  a  like  group  of  able  men,  such  as  were  gathered 
then.  Monroe,  Madison,  Marshall,  Upshur,  Barbour,  Dod- 
dridge,  Benjamin  Watkins,  Leigh,  Chapman,  Johnson, 
Giles,  Dromgoole,  Tyler,  Baldwin,  Stanard,  Randolph  of 
Roanoke,  Mercer,  Cooke,  Powell,  Summers,  Tazewell,  Gor 
don,  and  Alexander  Campbell  were  among  its  ninety-six 
members.  The  question  most  debated  was  the  basis  of 
representation  —  the  east  stoutly  contending  for  represen 
tation  founded  on  property  as  well  as  numbers,  which  was 
known  as  the  "  mixed  basis,"  while  the  western  members 
were  practically  a  unit  for  the  "  white  basis,"  or  representa 
tion  founded  on  white  manhood  suffrage  alone.  But  one 
man  from  tidewater,  General  Robert  B.  Taylor  of  Norfolk, 
favored  the  latter  system,  and  his  views  were  so  antago 
nistic  to  those  of  the  people  whom  he  represented,  that  he 
resigned  his  seat  during  the  sitting  of  the  convention.  In 


132  THE    LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

the  opinion  of  tke  eastern  members  the  attitude  of  the 
west  was  radical  in  the  extreme,  in  seeking  to  deny  prop 
erty  representation,  while,  on  the  other  hand,  the  west 
could  see  no  justice  in  a  system  which  gave  the  slave 
holders  a  voice  in  the  government,  all  out  of  proportion  to 
their  numerical  strength,  and  the  white  men  of  the  trans- 
montane  country  who  owned  no  property  were  denied  the 
ballot.  Although  the  argument  was  ably  urged  that 
property  demanded  protection,  which  it  could  not  obtain 
under  the  rule  of  King  Numbers  alone,  yet  there  can  be 
no  doubt  that  the  institution  of  slavery  was  the  real 
stumbling-block  in  preventing  the  two  sections  from 
arriving  at  a  solution  of  the  problem,  satisfactory  to  both 
sides.  In  his  address  to  the  convention,  James  Monroe, 
the  president  of  the  body,  said,  "  I  am  satisfied,  if  no  such 
thing  as  slavery  existed,  that  the  people  of  the  Atlantic 
border  would  meet  their  brethren  of  the  west  upon  the 
basis  of  a  majority  of  the  free  white  population." 

The  people  residing  beyond  the  mountains  had  as  their 
immediate  object  in  view,  in  struggling  for  an  increase  of 
representation,  the  gain  of  a  sufficient  number  of  votes  in 
the  legislature  to  insure  them  appropriations  for  public 
works,  of  which  they  stood  in  sore  need.  They,  time  and 
again,  disclaimed  any  intention  of  interfering  with  slavery 
in  the  east,  but  they  never  succeeded  in  dispelling  from 
the  minds  of  the  slaveholders  of  tidewater  their  doubts 
as  to  the  security  of  slave  property,  should  the  trans- 
montane  section  gain  control.  Nor  was  this  distrust  on 
the  part  of  the  low  country  altogether  without  good  reason, 
for  though  the  west  was  sincere  in  its  declaration  not  to 
interfere  with  the  slave  interest,  yet  there  was  probably  no 
time  between  1829  and  1860  when,  under  a  system  of  white 
manhood  suffrage,  the  majority  of  the  voters  of  the  State 
would  not  have  voted  for  any  reasonable  scheme  of  emanci- 


A   DIVERSITY    OF   INTEREST  133 

pation.  But  while  the  west  sought  not  to  disturb  the 
east  in  its  possessions,  it  had  viewed  with  almost  as  much 
alarm  the  removal  of  slave-owners  to  the  mountain  country, 
as  the  east  had  ever  regarded  any  diminution  of  its  power 
to  control  legislation.  It  was  in  answer  to  the  argument 
of  an  eastern  member,  that  there  would  soon  be  no  diver 
sity  of  interest  between  the  different  sections  of  the  State, 
that  Charles  J.  Faulkner  of  Berkeley  County  declared,  in 
January,  1832,  during  the  debates  in  the  legislature  grow 
ing  out  of  the  Nat  Turner  insurrection  :  "  Sir,  it  is  to  avert 
any  such  possible  consequence  to  my  country,  that  I,  one 
of  the  humblest,  but  not  the  least  determined,  of  the 
western  delegation,  have  raised  my  voice  for  emancipation. 
Sir,  tax  our  lands,  —  vilify  our  country,  —  carry  the  sword 
of  extermination  through  our  now  defenceless  villages, 
but  spare  us,  I  implore  you,  spare  us  the  curse  of  slavery  — 
that  bitterest  drop  from  the  chalice  of  the  destroying 
angel."  Though  it  is  not  probable  that  the  west,  from 
the  physical  character  of  the  country,  and  the  fact  that  its 
people  were  farmers  and  graziers,  and  not  planters,  as  in 
the  tidewater,  would  have  received  any  great  influx  of 
slave  population;  yet  the  representatives  of  that  section 
noted  that  some  of  the  Southern  States  at  this  time  were 
enacting  laws  against  the  importation  of  slaves,  and  it 
seemed  but  reasonable  that  the  black  tide,  which  would  be 
denied  outlet  to  the  southward,  would  pour  itself  west 
ward  across  the  Blue  Ridge  and  Alleghanies,  to  whose 
base  it  had  already  come.  The  mountaineers,  too,  had 
contrasted  their  rude,  but  well-tilled  country,  where  free 
white  labor  worked  the  soil,  with  the  eastern  section,  of 
which  Philip  A.  Boiling  of  Buckingham  said,  in  the  legis 
lature  in  1832 :  "If  we  turn  our  eyes  to  that  part  of  the 
country  which  lies  below  the  mountains,  and  particularly 
below  the  falls  of  the  rivers,  it  seems  as  if  some  judgment 


134  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

from  Heaven  had  poured  over  it  and  seared  it ;  fields  once 
cultivated  are  now  waste  and  desolate  —  the  eye  is  no 
longer  cheered  by  the  rich  verdure  that  decked  it  in  other 
days ;  no,  sir,  but  fatigued  by  an  interminable  wilderness 
of  worn-out,  gullied,  piny  old  fields." 

The  outcome  of  the  convention  of  1829  was  a  virtual 
victory  for  the  east,  although  representation  was  more 
nearly  equalized,  and  the  west  had  gained  forty-one  per 
cent  of  the  members  of  the  legislature  where  previously 
they  had  but  thirty-three.  Under  the  white  basis,  how 
ever,  they  would  have  received  forty-six  per  cent;  and 
the  final  settlement  of  the  question  was  thus  merely  post 
poned  to  a  future  day,  as  disaffection  still  existed. 

At  the  risk  of  wearying  the  reader,  the  author  has  felt 
himself  under  the  necessity  of  pointing  out  the  conditions 
which  led  up  to  the  convention  of  1850,  as  a  proper  knowl 
edge  of  them  is  necessary  to  an  understanding  of  Wise's 
political  career.  The  like  may  be  said  of  the  subject  of 
internal  improvements,  to  which  we  will  advert  as  briefly 
as  possible.  This  question  was  closely  allied  with  that 
of  representation,  so  much  so,  indeed,  that  in  a  certain 
sense  they  may  be  treated  as  having  been  almost  identical. 
If  the  reader  will  cast  his  eye  upon  the  map  of  Virginia, 
he  will  observe,  between  the  mouth  of  the  James  and  the 
Chesapeake,  the  magnificent  harbor  known  as  Hampton 
Roads,  capable  of  floating  the  navies  of  the  world.  And 
if  he  will  reflect  at  the  same  time  that  along  the  banks 
of  the  James  the  Englishman  made  his  first  permanent 
home  on  this  continent,  the  thought  must  come  to  him 
with  unusual  force,  that  it  is  strange  indeed  that  nowhere 
along  this  great  roadstead,  or  on  any  of  the  streams  empty 
ing  into  the  lower  Chesapeake,  is  there  to-day  a  city  of 
any  considerable  size.  When  he  further  considers  the 
magnificent  back  country,  lying  but  a  few  hundred  miles 


A   NEEDED    MARKET  135 

to  the  westward,  and  the  additional  fact  that  Chicago, 
St.  Louis,  Minneapolis,  St.  Paul,  and  Kansas  City  are  but 
the  growth  of  yesterday,  historically  speaking,  it  is  the 
more  remarkable  that  in  Virginia,  the  oldest  colony  of 
the  American  Union,  there  is  to-day  no  city  of  one  hun 
dred  thousand  inhabitants,  or  of  seventy  thousand  white 
population.  Yet  the  reason  for  this  fact  is  not  difficult 
to  discover,  for  from  the  settlement  at  Jamestown  down 
to  the  outbreak  of  the  war  between  the  States,  this  section 
was  dominated  by  the  plantation  interest,  which  was  anti- 
commercial  in  character,  and  little  disposed  to  encourage 
manufactures  and  internal  improvements. 

In  1831  a  convention  was  held  at  Lewisburg,  Green- 
brier  County,  by  the  people  of  the  surrounding  country, 
for  the  purpose  of  urging  the  necessity  of  connection  with 
the  seaboard,  in  order  to  furnish  an  outlet  for  western 
produce.  The  Richmond  Enquirer,  the  leading  paper  of 
the  State,  strongly  seconded  these  efforts,  despite  the  fact 
that  it  was  published  in  an  eastern  city,  and  in  one  of  its 
editorials  declared :  "  Our  western  citizens  want  a  market 
and  will  have  it.  If  they  do  not  find  it  in  Richmond,  they 
will  seek  it  and  they  will  obtain  it  in  Baltimore."  At 
that  time,  long  lines  of  wagon  trains  passed  down  the 
Shenandoah  Valley,  en  route  for  Baltimore,  and  a  few  far- 
seeing  men  urged  upon  Richmond  and  Norfolk  the  neces 
sity  of  acting  promptly,  if  they  would  prevent  this  trade 
from  being  permanently  diverted  in  another  direction. 

There  is  something  very  pitiable  in  the  contemplation 
of  Virginia  at  this  time ;  for  not  only  was  her  material 
condition  far  from  being  prosperous,  but  her  people  were 
divided  in  sentiment  and  failed  to  grasp  the  opportunities 
which  would  have  brought  about  her  revival  from  the 
slough  into  which  she  had  fallen.  A  contributor  to  the 
Enquirer  of  February  8,  1831,  thus  describes  the  general 


136  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

appearance  of  the  country :  "  Wretched  highways,  scarcely 
passable ;  noble,  majestic  streams,  either  wholly  neglected, 
or  encumbered  by  ill-digested  and  expensive  attempts  at 
improvements;  dangerous  bridges,  badly  constructed  by 
heavy  county  taxation,  or  owned  by  individuals  who  keep 
them  in  bad  order,  and  oppressive  tolls;  and  that,  under 
laws  which  give  them  exclusive  rights  to  do  so  forever : 
deserted  fields,  covered  with  broom  sedge  and  intersected 
by  gullies;  decayed,  patched-up,  and  worthless  fences; 
half-cultivated  farms  and  plantations,  without  adequate 
farm  buildings  and  conveniences,  or  even  comfortable 
quarters  for  laborers ;  miserable  hovels  scattered  in  every 
direction,  and  relieved,  but  occasionally,  by  the  appearance 
of  dwellings  which  promise  comfort  and  independence ; 
a  population,  restless,  dissatisfied,  in  debt  and  dependent 
on  other  States  for  many  of  the  necessities  and  comforts  of 
life,  without  the  means  to  buy.  These  and  many  other 
degrading  spectacles  present  themselves  to  our  daily 
observance." 

While,  of  course,  there  were  localities  which  did  not 
answer  to  this  description,  it  was,  however,  generally  true 
of  the  country  east  of  the  Piedmont  section.1 

Yet  it  should  be  said  that  there  were  many  Virginians, 
even  at  that  day,  who  lamented  the  decadence  of  their 

1  It  should  be  stated  in  this  connection  that  the  condition  of  Virginia 
was  greatly  improved  between  1845-60.  Not  only  had  agricultural  prod 
ucts  risen  in  price  during  the  decade  prior  to  the  Civil  War,  but  the 
methods  of  farming  were  probably  better,  and  more  attention  was 
directed  to  the  rotation  of  crops,  and  the  "five-field"  system  was 
adopted  in  many  instances.  Tidewater  Virginia,  with  the  exception  of 
the  river  and  bottom  lands,  was,  generally  speaking,  a  poor  country,  and 
although  the  soil  is  easily  worked  and  responsive  to  kindly  cultivation 
yet  it  does  not  hold  improvements  j  and  an  old  farm  that  has  been  care 
fully  tilled  for  years,  if  left  to  itself  will  soon  grow  up  in  broom  straw 
and  scrub  pines.  Prior  to  the  war  Edmund  Ruffin  had  written  at  great 
length  on  the  subject  of  the  use  of  green  sand  marl,  and  other  manures, 
and  they  were  more  generally  used  than  was  the  case  in  1830. 


THE   FIRST   RAILWAY    CHARTER  137 

State,  and  who  longed  to  see  her  reap  the  benefit  of  the 
improvements  and  inventions  of  the  age  and  assume  the 
foremost  position  in  the  work  of  industrial  development. 
Though  the  great  majority  were  most  interested,  as  an  old 
gentleman  once  remarked,  in  the  question  "  of  the  price 
of  tobacco  and  whom  they  should  elect  President,"  there 
were  those  who  anxiously  strove  to  turn  the  faces  of 
their  people  from  the  dead  past  to  the  living  present  — 
from  memories  and  bygone  glories  to  the  duties  of  the 
future.  Men  like  Joseph  C.  Cabell,  Wyndham  Robertson, 
Claudius  Crozet,  Moncure  Robinson,  and  Charles  Ellet 
were  equal  to  the  pioneers  in  any  State  in  the  ability, 
energy,  and  zeal  which  they  displayed  in  keeping  Vir 
ginians  apace  with  the  industrial  activity  of  the  age  in 
the  construction  of  railways  and  other  lines  of  communi 
cation. 

On  February  10,  1830,  the  first  railway  charter  ever 
obtained  in  Virginia  was  granted  to  the  Petersburg  and 
Weldon  Railroad,  and  between  that  date  and  the  year 
1840  the  construction  of  about  three  hundred  miles  of 
road  was  undertaken  on  various  lines.  These  included 
the  Winchester  and  Potomac  Roads,  designed  to  connect 
the  valley  with  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio  at  Harper's  Ferry, 
and  carry  the  trade  of  that  section  to  Baltimore ;  the 
Seaboard  and  Roanoke,  running  from  Portsmouth  to  a 
point  on  the  Roanoke  River ;  the  Richmond,  Fredericks- 
burg  and  Potomac,  intended  to  give  a  route  due  north 
from  Richmond;  the  Louisa  Road,  connecting  Hanover 
Junction  on  the  former  line  with  Louisa  County,  and 
the  Richmond  and  Petersburg  Railroad,  uniting  the  two 
cities  of  those  names.  All  these  lines,  however,  except 
the  Winchester  and  Potomac,  were  in  eastern  Virginia,  and 
communication  between  the  eastern  and  western  portions 
of  the  State  was  as  roundabout  and  difficult  as  ever,  as 


138  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

there  was  no  railroad  across  the  Blue  Ridge  and  Alle- 
ghanies,  which  stood  as  barriers,  shutting  off  the  people  of 
one  section  from  those  of  another.  Frequently  travellers 
coming  from  beyond  the  mountains  to  eastern  Virginia 
would  go  around  by  way  of  Baltimore,  so  difficult  were 
the  modes  of  travel  across  the  mountains. 

In  1850  the  James  River  and  Kanawha  Canal  was  in 
operation  between  Richmond  and  Lynchburg,  and  the 
western  members  of  the  legislature  would  come  in  stage 
coaches  across  the  mountains  to  the  last-named  city,  where 
they  would  take  the  boat,  in  which,  packed  to  the  point  of 
suffocation,  they  would  be  drawn  by  mules  to  the  capital, 
about  one  hundred  and  fifty  miles  distant. 

Perhaps  no  country  on  earth  possesses  a  greater  number 
of  magnificent  navigable  streams  than  tidewater  Virginia, 
yet  this  fact,  strange  to  say,  was  destined  to  greatly  hinder, 
rather  than  advance,  the  growth  and  development  of  the 
State.  By  way  of  the  Potomac,  the  Rappahannock,  the 
York,  the  James,  and  the  numerous  estuaries,  creeks,  and 
arms  of  the  Chesapeake  and  Atlantic  which  exist  in  that 
region,  vessels  could  come  up  almost  to  the  barn-doors  of 
the  planters,  thus  affording  them  cheap  and  convenient 
transportation  facilities.  On  this  account,  even  more  than 
owing  to  the  sloth  of  the  slaveholding  community,  the 
population  of  the  eastern  counties  were  singularly  in 
different  in  regard  to  works  of  internal  improvement; 
and  when  bills  in  furtherance  of  those  ends  were  before 
the  legislature,  through  their  representatives  opposed 
them  regularly.  This  opposition  on  their  part  gave  rise 
to  an  abominable  system  of  "  log-rolling,"  and  it  was  only 
by  this  means  that  an  appropriation  of  public  improve 
ment  could  ever  be  obtained.  It  was  largely  for  this 
reason  that  great  dissatisfaction  continued  to  prevail 
among  the  transmontane  people  with  the  constitution 


HINDRANCES   TO   PROGRESS  139 

adopted  in  1830,  as  the  power  and  attitude  of  the  tidewater 
section  in  the  legislature  blocked  the  way  to  effectual  State 
aid  in  the  construction  of  railways,  turnpikes,  and  canals. 

Threats  of  separation  from  the  State  were  freely  indulged 
in  throughout  the  western  country,  for  though  the  people 
there  were  loyal  Virginians,  they  felt  that  there  was  no 
disposition  on  the  part  of  the  east  to  accede  to  their  de 
mands.  But  one  man  in  the  legislature  from  the  lowland 
counties  advocated  appropriations  for  public  works.  This 
was  Joseph  Segar,  who  represented  first  Northampton 
County,  on  the  eastern  shore,  and  later  Elizabeth  City 
County.  His  speeches  in  this  behalf,  still  preserved  in 
the  newspapers  of  that  period,  prove  him  to  have  been 
a  liberal-minded  and  far-seeing  statesman,  with  a  full 
appreciation  of  the  needs  of  his  State ;  but  unfortunately 
he  was  ahead  of  the  people  of  his  time  in  the  section  from 
which  he  hailed. 

Wise's  opinions,  on  the  great  questions  of  suffrage  and 
internal  improvements,  had  been,  from  the  earliest  period 
of  his  public  life,  heartily  in  favor  of  unrestricted  suffrage""" 
and  liberal  encouragement  to  railways  and  improvementsi>iiiw^- 
of  all  sorts.  By  nature  a  thorough  Democrat,  he  believed  ^^ 
in  the  right  of  every  man  to  vote,  and  he  looked  too  far 
ahead  not  to  appreciate  the  urgent  necessity  of  the  union 
of  the  west  and  east,  which,  in  his  opinion,  could  only  be 
accomplished  by  bonds  of  steel  rails.  There  was  too  little 
individual  wealth  at  the  time  beyond  the  mountains,  and 
railway  construction  in  that  country  too  expensive,  for  the 
people  of  the  west  to  do  this  unaided,  and  he  consequently 
favored  their  demands  for  State  aid.  This,  however,  he 
considered  would  redound  to  the  great  benefit  of  the  tide 
water  section,  as  well  as  the  west,  and  was  of  equal 
importance  to  both. 

During  the  month  of  April,  in  the  year  1837,  Wise  was 


140  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.   WISE 

tendered  a  dinner  by  prominent  citizens  of  the  city  of 
Norfolk,  and  in  the  course  of  a  speech  delivered  upon 
that  occasion  said :  "  Never  did  any  people  under  the  sun 
make  as  gross  a  mistake  as  did  the  people  of  the  Chesa 
peake  counties,  the  counties  of  tidewater  Virginia,  in  the 
year  1829,  when  the  convention  sat.  Sir,  we  warred  with 
our  natural  allies.  The  counties  of  the  valley  and  the 
transmontane  counties  are  the  back  country  of  Virginia  — 
we  have  the  seaport.  The  seaport  conflicted  and  con 
tended  with  the  only  source  of  its  trade  and  commerce. 
Richmond  and  Petersburg  can  never  be  any  other  than 
manufacturing  cities  —  that  is  enough  for  them.  Instead 
of  clubbing  interests  with  the  western  people,  we  united 
with  the  people  between  us  and  the  mountains,  who  are 
interested  to  cut  us  off  from  the  west.  Laboring  under 
this  grand  and  grievous  mistake  our  host  of  good  and 
great  men  —  Virginia  never  had  more  of  such  —  our 
Leighs  and  Randolphs  and  Tazewells  and  Taylors  —  no, 
I  beg  pardon  of  the  memory  of  that  honored  and  lamented 
and  clear-sighted  man,  General  Robert  B.  Taylor  —  he 
made  no  mistake,  and  was  ostracized  for  it  —  our  Upshurs 
and  Joynes — and  all  our  talents  and  greatness  were  exerted 
to  their  utmost  to  prove  a  monstrous  proposition:  That 
a  Majority  have  not  the  Right  to  govern  a  Free  Republic 
—  merely  to  strip  our  own  natural  allies  of  their  just 
portion  of  power  in  the  State.  With  a  fortuitous  majority 
we  conquered  a  majority  and  conquered  ourselves.  What 
have  been  the  consequences?  Norfolk  and  Portsmouth 
have  dwindled,  the  inland  towns  are  an  incubus  upon 
their  unequalled  harbor  for  a  port  —  and  every  leading 
man  almost  in  lowland  Virginia  who  was  in  that  un 
fortunate  convention,  except  Messrs.  Barbour  and  Nicho 
las,  and  a  few  others  who  have  taken  the  bounty  and  sold 
out  to  the  Dutch,  have  been  prostrated  and  damned  in  the 


A  SPEECH  AT  NORFOLK  141 

esteem  of  all  western  Virginians.      Any  political  cause 
which  has  the  name  of  a  Leigh,  a  Tazewell,  or  an  Upshur 
identified  with  it,  no  matter  what  may  be  its  intrinsic 
merits,  no   matter   how   it   may   involve    the   honor   and 
interests  of  the  State  and  the  Union,  and  all  upon  which 
it  depends,  is  doomed  in  western  Virginia.     A  demagogue 
who  was  not  in  the  convention,  who  lives  midland  on  the 
western   borders,  has   only  to  seize  upon    this   sectional 
grudge  against  a  name,  and  no  issue  whatever   can   be 
fairly  tried  before  the  people.     What  is  the  remedy  ?     Sir, 
we  must  heal  and  repair  these  internal  dissensions  which 
distract  and  divide  us ;  we  must  restore  State  harmony, 
atone  for  past  wrongs,  become   socially,  politically,  and 
commercially  united  with  the  west,  and  all  will  be  well. 
Norfolk  and  Portsmouth  must  be  made  to  reach  out  their 
Briarean  arms  of  internal  improvement.     Our  works  must 
radiate  from  this  centre  to  every  point  of   the  compass. 
You  must  reach  south  to  Charleston  —  North  Carolina's 
trade  is  yours,  her  coast  is  sand-bound  and  she  can  have 
no  port  —  nature  forbids  it.     You  must  reach  north,  by 
the  Eastern  Shore  Railroad,  to  Philadelphia.     You  will 
thus  become  the  great  central  emporium,  and,  above  all, 
you  must  reach  out  due  west,  to  the  Big  Bend  of   the 
Ohio  River !    Behold  Norfolk  and  Portsmouth,  with  these 
lines  of  improvement — they  then  will  have  capital,  because 
they  will  have  trade ;   trade,  because  they  will  have  the 
great  carriers  of  trade.     Unite  with  the  west,  say  I,  to  all 
the  tidewater  country — give  them  what  they  want,  outlets 
without  stint  or  number ;  make  Norfolk  and  Portsmouth  a 
New  York,  and  every  tongue  of  land  by  the  Chesapeake 
will  be  a  Long  Island.     God  speed  the   day  when  thus 
Virginia  will  become  united,  will  progress  more  rapidly 
than  ever  any  new  State  did,  to  her  wonted  and  certain 
Dominion  —  when  she  will  become  herself  again !  " 


142  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY  A.  WISE 

No  man  within  the  limits  of  the  Commonwealth  believed 
more  strongly  than  did  Wise  in  the  great  industrial  fu 
ture  that  awaited  Virginia  when  her  resources  should  be 
developed  along  commercial  and  other  lines,  instead  of 
agriculturally  alone;  but  he  realized  keenly  the  laissez- 
faire  spirit  of  the  people  and  their  indifference  regarding 
the  improvements  of  the  age,  which  had  caused  Virginia 
to  become  a  laggard  in  the  race  for  supremacy  in  the 
Union.  In  a  letter  to  his  friend,  Caleb  Gushing,  he  spoke 
of  his  own  district  as  "  old,  moss-grown,  and  slipshod " ; 
and  in  his  speeches  to  the  people,  he  pleaded  with  them  to 
wake  up.  In  an  address  delivered  upon  the  floor  of  Con 
gress  in  1837,  in  replying  to  the  argument  of  a  Southern 
member,  that  a  national  bank  was  injurious  to  the  South, 
Wise  said :  "  In  many  respects,  sir,  but  in  none  so  much 
as  in  relation  to  the  improvements  of  commerce  and  of  the 
mechanic  arts,  are  the  Southern  people  a  half-century 
behind  the  times  in  which  they  live.  Noble,  generous, 
liberal-minded,  brave,  independent,  intelligent,  and  saga 
cious,  yet  are  many  of  them  too  metaphysical  and  likely  — 
as  Mr.  Letcher  used  to  say  of  old  Virginia,  to  die  of  an  ab 
straction  !  They  admire  and  cherish  old  things  and  ways, 
and  despise,  without  much  reason,  improvements  in  the 
credit  system  just  as  they  do  a  new  lapel  or  button !  They 
do  not  enlarge,  as  I  said  on  a  former  occasion,  their  capaci 
ties  to  receive  the  benefits  of  any  institutions  of  trade; 
they  do  not  calculate  their  losses  in  the  destruction  of 
them  when  created  and  existing,  but  look  alone  with  dis 
satisfaction  to  the  greater  benefits  which  others  received 
from  improved  capacities  and  enlarged  advantages.  They 
claim  justly  that  nature  has  done  the  most  for  them ;  are 
content  with  what  nature  has  done  for  them,  and  are  only 
discontented  when  they  behold  the  art  of  others  outstrip 
ping  their  friend  nature.  They  are  only  wrong,  sir,  in  not 


A   NEW   CONSTITUTIONAL   CONVENTION   CALLED      143 

improving  and  assisting  their  own  natural  advantages,  and 
in  wishing  to  prevent  others  from  exerting  their  enterprise 
and  wits  to  make  up  for  natural  deficiencies,  whilst  they 
are  unwilling  to  exert  their  own  wits  and  enterprise  at  all." 
The  agitation  for  a  new  constitutional  convention  in 
Virginia  was  not  allowed  to  abate  by  the  western  mem 
bers,  but  was  kept  up  with  renewed  vigor  during  the 
period  from  1830  to  1850.  The  trans-Alleghany  people 
continued  at  times  to  talk  freely  of  separation,  and  com 
plained  of  a  system  under  which  they  received  scant  assist 
ance  from  the  State  for  any  purpose,  while  they  are,  at  the 
same  time,  largely  denied  participation  in  the  political 
offices  of  the  Commonwealth.  The  long-continued  efforts 
of  the  west  for  reform  were  at  last  crowned  with  success, 
during  the  winter  of  1849-50,  when,  owing  to  a  sentiment 
that  had  arisen  in  the  east  as  well,  in  favor  of  needed 
changes  in  the  organic  law,  the  legislature  passed  an  act 
providing  that  a  vote  of  the  people  should  be  taken  to  de 
termine  the  question  of  calling  a  constitutional  conven 
tion.  The  passage  of  this  act  was,  however,  at  the  time 
regarded  as  an  eastern  victory,  as  it  provided  for  an  elec 
tion  of  delegates  apportioned  upon  the  mixed  basis  of 
representation,  which  would  insure  a  majority  in  the  con 
vention  in  sympathy  with  the  country  lying  nearest  the 
Atlantic.  "  The  supposed  white  population  in  1849  was 
887,717,  and  the  revenue  tax  was  $472,516,31 ;  and  since 
this  apportionment  for  the  convention  was  to  be  on  the 
mixed  basis  (taxation  and  white  population  combined) 
every  $7,000.24  elected  one  delegate,  and  every  13,151 
white  persons  one  delegate.  This  meant  that  in  the  con 
vention  every  white  person  was  to  have  just  a  little  more 
than  half  as  much  weight  as  a  dollar  in  taxes." l  The  section 

1  "  Representation  in  Virginia,"  by  Julian  A.  C.  Chandler,  pages  56,  57, 
Johns  Hopkins  University  Studies. 


144  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

of  the  State  east  of  the  mountains  thus  secured  76  of  the 
135  delegates.  For  this  reason  most  of  the  counties  be 
yond  the  Alleghanies  voted  against  the  convention,  but  the 
bill  passed  by  a  good  majority. 

On  the  6th  of  May,  1850,  Wise  issued  an.  address  to  the 
people  of  his  district,  which  was  composed  of  the  two 
counties  of  Accomack  and  Northampton,  announcing  him 
self  a  candidate  to  represent  them  in  the  convention,  to 
revise  the  constitution.  After  declaring  himself  in  favor 
of  a  liberal  public  school  system,  he  continued :  "  I  hold 
that  the  only  true  element  of  representation  in  the  legisla 
ture  is  the  will  of  the  people.  That  property,  whether  it 
consists  of  horses  and  lands,  or  carriages,  or  cash,  or  an  ox, 
or  a  maid-servant,  or  a  man-servant,  or  of  anything  that  is 
a  man's,  having  no  will  has  no  right  as  such  to  be  repre 
sented  ;  morally,  the  owner  of  it  has  the  right  only  to  have 
it  protected  by  the  constitution  and  the  law.  That  repre 
sentation  ought  to  be  fairly  and  equally  as  possible  appor 
tioned  among  the  legal  voters  of  the  State,  those  who  are 
endowed  by  the  Creator  with  reason,  free-will,  and  con 
science,  and  by  the  constitution  with  political  entity  and 
the  franchise  of  suffrage.  That  the  will  of  the  majority  of 
legal  voters,  subject  only  to  the  constitutional  guarantees 
of  protection  to  minorities  of  persons  and  to  property,  ought 
to  give  the  law  to  the  State.  That  minorities  of  persons 
represented,  and  property  unrepresented,  are  entitled  to 
constitutional  guarantees  of  protection,  and  the  majority  in 
convention  is  bound  to  provide  them.  That  they  can  be 
easily  provided  and  can  be  made  ample  and  certain  securi 
ties  against  all  unequal  burdens  and  oppressions  upon  a 
minority,  or  upon  property.  That  our  present  representa 
tion  in  the  legislature  —  based  as  in  part  it  is  practically 
on  slaves,  who  have  no  political  voice  or  entity,  on  car 
riages,  which  are  in  many  instances  but  extravagant  luxu- 


THE  PROJECTED  REFORMS  145 

ries,  and  on  licenses  to  sell  ivhiskey,  which  are  human 
curses  — is  not  only  fundamentally  aristocratic  and  anti- 
republican,  but  it  has  proven  utterly  futile  and  fallacious  in 
protecting  the  State  from  an  onerous  debt  of  fifteen  mill 
ions  of  dollars  for  local  works  of  minor  importance  or 
values  to  any,  and  of  no  profit  to  the  tidewater  region, 
whilst  it  degrades  our  brethren  in  the  western  portion  of 
the  State  by  its  individious  inequality." 

Among  other  reforms  Wise  declared  himself  in  favor 
of  biennial,  instead  of  annual,  sittings  of  the  legislature, 
the  abolition  of  imprisonment  for  debt,  and  the  extension 
of  the  right  of  suffrage  to  every  white  male  citizen,  above 
twenty  years  of  age,  who  had  resided  six  months  in  the 
Commonwealth.  He  furthermore  advocated  a  law  that  a 
man  should  vote  but  once  in  the  State  at  any  one  election, 
and  that  no  man  should  be  allowed  to  vote  upon  his  property 
of  any  description,  and  favored  the  election  of  the  gov 
ernor,  judges,  and  executive  and  municipal  officers  by  the 
people,  and  the  abolition  of  the  County  Court  system.  To 
us  at  the  close  of  the  nineteenth  century  there  seems  noth 
ing  peculiarly  radical  and  revolutionary  in  these  views, 
nor  were  they  so  considered  in  many  States  of  the  Union 
in  the  year  1850,  even  prior  to  that  time;  for  ours  is  a 
levelling  age  and  distinctions  of  class  have  been  rapidly 
broken  down.  It  is  hence  difficult  to  realize  the  attitude 
of  the  people  of  Virginia  on  these  questions,  as  late  as  the 
middle  of  this  century ;  but,  with  their  habitual  dislike  of 
innovations  and  their  devotion  to  conservative  tradition, 
many  of  the  leading  citizens  of  the  State  regarded  the 
views  of  a  man  like  Wise  as  worthy  of  the  French  Revo 
lution.  Alone  and  single-handed  he  stood,  in  tidewater 
Virginia  in  1850,  as  an  advocate  of  the  suffrage  or  white 
basis  of  representation,  and  that,  too,  in  a  district  that  had 
sent  Upshur  and  Joynes,  two  of  the  strongest  champions  of 


146  THE   LIFE   OP   HENRY   A.  WISE 

the  mixed  basis,  to  the  convention  of  1829.  The  counties 
of  Accomack  and  Northampton  were  composed  of  a  rural 
population,  were  traversed  by  no  line  of  railroad,  no  news 
paper  was  published  in  their  limits,  and  the  people  re 
mained  unchanged  in  their  condition  and  habits  of  thought, 
and  the  spirit  of  modern  change  and  innovation  had  gained 
no  entrance  in  their  midst.  Their  views  on  the  question 
of  representation,  the  main  subject  at  issue,  were  diamet 
rically  opposed  to  those  enunciated  by  Wise,  and  the  con 
servative  land  and  slave-owners  of  the  peninsula  were  little 
disposed  to  embark  upon  a  system  of  government  where 
mere  numbers  were  to  be  given  absolute  dominion,  and 
property  was  to  be  left,  in  their  opinion,  without  adequate 
protection.  Wise  went  before  the  people  and  addressed 
them  at  length  upon  the  questions  at  issue,  and  despite 
his  isolated  position  was  chosen  one  of  the  two  delegates 
from  his  district,  his  colleague,  Louis  C.  H.  Finney,  being 
elected  at  the  same  time  as  a  mixed  basis  man.  Thus  the 
people  of  the  eastern  shore  chose  two  delegates  of  radi 
cally  different  views,  the  one,  because  he  truly  represented 
their  ideas,  and  the  other,  because  of  their  personal  admi 
ration  and  devotion  to  him.  Wise  always  considered  this 
election,  as  in  many  respects  it  was,  the  greatest  victory 
of  his  political  life. 

The  convention  that  assembled  in  the  Capitol  building 
at  Richmond,  on  the  14th  of  August,  1850,  unlike  the  one 
which  gathered  in  1829,  was  not  particularly  remarkable 
for  the  group  of  distinguished  men  it  contained,  and  many 
persons  commented  upon  the  number  of  comparatively 
unknown  and  youthful  delegates.  Those  disposed  to 
criticise  alleged  that  this  arose  mainly  from  the  fact  that 
party  service  and  prejudice  had  entered  largely  into  the 
choice  of  delegates,  which  frequently  resulted  in  the  ablest 
men  being  left  at  home.  Another  subject  of  adverse  com- 


DELEGATES   TO   THE   CONVENTION  147 

ment  was  the  fact,  that  of  the  135  delegates,  97  of  them 
were  lawyers,  who  were  compared  by  a  writer  of  the 
time  to  the  plagues  of  the  Egyptians.  It  might  be  re 
marked,  however,  that  from  this  profession  have  arisen 
most  of  the  leaders  in  nearly  every  struggle  for  liberty, 
and  that,  moreover,  the  convention  of  1850  had  about  it 
an  appearance  of  freshness  and  vigor  which  the  earlier 
gathering  of  Virginia  statesmen  had  not  possessed.  John 
Y.  Mason,  a  man  well  versed  in  public  affairs,  and  a  mem 
ber  of  the  previous  convention,  was  chosen  as  the  presiding 
officer.  Among  the  list  of  delegates  were  George  W. 
Summers  of  Kanawha,  a  son  of  the  able  Lewis  Summers 
who  figured  in  the  convention  of  1829,  an  orator  of  persuasive 
eloquence ;  Robert  E.  Scott  of  Fauquier,  a  master  of  logi 
cal  argument ;  James  H.  Ferguson  of  Logan,  a  man  of  but 
limited  education,  but  powerful  intellect;  John  Minor 
Botts  of  Henrico ;  Muscoe  R.  H.  Garnett  of  Essex ; 
Beverley  B.  Douglas  of  King  William;  R.  L.  T.  Beale 
of  Westmoreland;  Thomas  J.  Randolph  of  Albemarle; 
Walter  D.  Leake  of  Goochland ;  James  Barbour  of  Cul- 
peper ;  John  Janney  of  Loudoun ;  John  T.  Anderson  of 
Botetourt;  John  Letcher  of  Rockbridge,  afterward  gov 
ernor;  Hugh  W.  Sheffey  of  Augusta;  Green  B.  Samuels 
of  Shenandoah ;  Charles  J.  Faulkner  of  Berkeley ;  Joseph 
Johnson  of  Harrison,  afterward  governor;  John  S.  Car 
lisle  of  Barbour;  Allen  T.  Caperton  of  Monroe;  Robert 
C.  Stanard,  James  Lyons,  and  John  A.  Meredith  of  Rich 
mond  ;  Benjamin  R.  Floyd  of  Wythe ;  George  W.  Hopkins 
of  Washington ;  Waitman  T.  Willey  of  Monongalia,  and 
others,  who  proved  that,  though  the  older  generation  of 
Virginia  statesmen  had  passed  away,  she  still  had  within 
her  borders  many  men  of  a  high  order  of  intellect.  After 
remaining  in  session  several  weeks,  the  convention  ad 
journed  November  the  4th  in  order  to  receive  the  bene- 


148  THE    LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.   WISE 

fit  of  the  new  census,  but  reassembled  during  the  month 
of  January  following,  and  remained  in  continuous  session 
till  August. 

The  great  question  of  representation  transcended  all 
others  in  importance  ;  and  in  the  long  argument  which 
ensued,  each  delegate  apparently  felt  it  his  bounden 
duty  to  give  utterance  to  his  views  upon  the  various 
schemes  of  apportionment  presented  to  the  convention. 
Comparatively  little  new  light,  however,  was  brought 
to  bear  upon  the  subject,  it  having  been  thoroughly 
gone  over  and  exhausted  by  Upshur,  Doddridge,  and 
others,  in  the  convention  of  1829.  Messrs.  Scott,  Stan- 
ard,  Barbour,  and  the  other  eastern  champions  contended 
that  by  the  adoption  of  the  white  or  suffrage  basis, 
the  west,  which  paid  but  about  one-third  of  the  taxes, 
would  be  given  the  control;  that  property  would  fail  to 
receive  adequate  protection,  that  a  mere  numerical  major 
ity  would  rule,  instead  of  a  majority  in  interest ;  and  that 
the  west  would  impose  heavy  taxes  for  the  purpose  of 
improvements,  and  would,  furthermore,  overtax  or  abolish 
slavery,  and  extend  the  railroad  between  Winchester  and 
Baltimore,  thus  carrying  the  trade  of  the  valley  and 
mountain  region  to  the  latter  city. 

On  Wednesday,  April  23,  Wise  began  his  speech  in 
favor  of  the  white  basis  in  these  words :  "  Mr.  President, 
for  myself,  personally,  on  this  subject,  I  have  not  one 
word  to  say.  All  personal  considerations  are  overshad 
owed  by  the  Coliseum  of  the  State  !  What  man  —  what 
mere  man,  now  living,  is  worthy  to  be  considered  —  to  be 
weighed  in  the  balance  at  this  moment,  when  the  *  crisis 
of  our  fate  has  come,'  and  Virginia  —  Virginia  is  in  the 
scale  ?  .  .  .  What  are  local  considerations,  what  is  trans- 
Alleghany,  what  is  the  valley,  what  is  Piedmont,  what  is 
tidewater,  what  are  these  mere  sectional  conflicts  com- 


A   FIVE   DAYS'    SPEECH  149 

pared  with  the  entire,  immeasurable  interests  of  the  State, 
as  a  whole  State  —  a  State  measured  by  herself  in  the 
past,  a  State  that  cannot  be  measured  for  the  future? 
Now,  the  question  is,  whether  in  this  moment  of  general 
rivalry  among  States,  Virginia  shall  remain  supine  and 
dormant,  or  whether  Virginia  shall  not  reach  out  her 
hands  to  take  an  empire  more  magnificent  than  that  of 
the  Caesars." 

The  idea  of  a  division  of  the  State,  he  declared  that 
he  would  not  allow  himself  to  contemplate  or  discuss. 
Throughout  Wednesday,  Thursday,  Friday,  Saturday,  and 
the  Monday  following,  he  consumed  the  whole  of  the 
day  and  night  sessions  of  the  convention.  But  though  he 
spoke  for  five  days,  he  never  flagged  for  an  instant,  nor 
did  his  audience  weary  of  hearing  him,  for  during  his 
entire  speech  the  aisles  and  galleries  were  crowded  with 
eager  listeners.  A  comparative  stranger  in  Richmond, 
the  people  were  anxious  to  see  the  man,  to  whom  not 
only  an  unusual  degree  of  interest  attached  on  account 
of  his  marked  personality  and  fervid  eloquence,  but  be 
cause  he  alone  among  the  members  from  tidewater  cham 
pioned  the  cause  of  the  west.  In  adverting  to  the  great 
speech  of  Upshur,  delivered  twenty  years  before,  Wise 
denied  that  there  were  no  a  priori  rules  of  government, 
and  that  men  did  not  stand  upon  a  status  in  the  State, 
above  property;  or  that  government  was  instituted  pri 
marily  for  the  protection  of  the  latter.  He  pointed  out 
the  injustice  of  the  system,  by  which  a  majority  of  ninety- 
four  thousand  white  voters  west  of  the  mountains  were 
denied  an  equal  voice  with  the  east,  merely  because  the 
east  paid  an  excess  of  $182,000.00  of  taxes  and  on  three 
hundred  and  forty-eight  thousand  slaves,  and  declared  that 
these  men  west  of  the  mountains  were  their  brother  Vir 
ginians,  and  that  it  was  wrong  thus  to  distrust  and  huinili- 


150  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

ate  them.  He  founded  his  argument  for  the  suffrage 
basis,  not  only  on  the  bill  of  rights,  but  the  further  fact 
that  man  was  given  dominion  over  the  earth,  and  alone 
possessed  will  power  and  volition.  He  dwelt  at  length 
upon  the  need  of  railways  and  material  development  in 
Virginia,  and  pointed  out  the  great  future  that  lay  before 
the  people,  when  they  should  make  use  of  their  advan 
tages.  The  idea  of  the  west  abolishing  slavery  he  com 
bated  as  a  slaveholder  himself,  and  maintained  that  the 
east  could  not  more  surely  cause  the  people  beyond  the 
mountains  to  hate  slavery  than  by  permitting  them  to 
realize  that  that  institution  was  the  cause  of  full  repre 
sentation  being  withheld  from  them,  and  of  their  fail 
ure  to  secure  internal  improvements.  When,  he  argued, 
the  people  of  the  mountains  discuss  among  themselves 
why  they  are  cut  off  from  the  world  and  denied  communi 
cation  with  the  eastern  markets,  and  when  they  further 
ask  themselves  the  question  why  Virginia  was  lacking  in 
the  public  improvements  and  advantages  of  other  States, 
the  answer  would  come  to  them  that  it  was  "  because  black 
slaves  make  white  slaves !  "  In  closing  his  long  speech  he 
said:  "Give  us  an  united  people  with  one  affection,  one 
interest,  one  feeling,  and  one  impulse.  If  any  people  upon 
the  face  of  God's  earth  ought  to  be  inspired  by  the  recol 
lection  and  glories  of  the  past,  it  is  Virginia ;  for  she  has 
more  than  Greece  or  Rome  to  inspire  her.  With  the 
glory  of  the  past  to  inspire  her,  what  might  she  not 
achieve?  Give  me  for  the  people  of  Virginia  free  and 
universal  education,  give  me  free  and  equal  suffrage, 
give  me  free  and  universal  representation  for  our  people, 
and  who  can  foretell  our  destiny  ?  "  Although  his  address 
to  the  convention  was  marred  at  intervals  by  intemperance 
of  language,  yet  his  effort  was  undoubtedly  a  great  one, 
and  produced  a  strong  effect.  If  he  did  not  possess  to  the 


THE   ADOPTION   OF   A   COMPROMISE  151 

same  degree  the  winning  eloquence  of  George  W.  Sum 
mers,  nor  yet  the  logical  power  of  Robert  E.  Scott,  he 
did  have  in  a  greater  measure  than  either  of  them  the 
power  of  riveting  the  attention  of  an  assemblage  and 
impressing  his  views  upon  them.  The  Whig  had  pro 
nounced  him  "  a  modern  Jack  Cade  "  and  said  that  his 
speech  was  made  up  largely  of  abuse  of  the  rich  and 
aristocrats;  but  any  man  holding  Wise's  views  at  that 
time,  in  eastern  Virginia,  would  have  been  regarded  as  a 
radical,  if  not  a  revolutionist. 

After  long,  weary  months  of  debate,  during  which 
proposition  after  proposition  in  regard  to  the  apportion 
ment  was  voted  down,  a  compromise  measure  was  at 
last  adopted.  By  this  plan  the  apportionment  for  the 
House  of  Delegates  was  on  the  suffrage  basis,  and  that 
of  the  Senate  on  a  purely  arbitrary  one ;  but  the  west 
had  gained  the  victory,  for  it  secured  a  majority  of 
four  on  joint  ballot.  Many  men  in  the  tidewater  sec 
tion  regarded  the  new  constitution  as  violative  of  the 
rights  of  the  east,  and  some  talked  of  a  division  of  the 
State  —  among  whom  was  Littleton  Waller  Tazewell  — 
before  surrendering  the  mixed  basis.  The  new  constitu 
tion  was  adopted  by  an  overwhelming  vote  of  the  people, 
and  Virginia  had  at  last  become  democratic  in  fact,  as 
she  had  long  been  in  theory.  It  must  not  be  forgotten, 
too,  that  a  tremendous  forward  stride  had  been  made  in 
other  respects  than  the  new  representation,  for  after  the 
adoption  of  the  constitution  there  was  to  be  an  abolition 
of  the  law  allowing  freeholders  only  to  vote ;  the  gov 
ernor,  judges,  and  other  officers  were  to  be  elected  by 
the  people,  and  many  relics  of  feudalism  had  disappeared, 
and  for  once  it  seemed  that  the  people  of  Virginia  were 
thoroughly  permeated  by  the  spirit  of  the  age  in  which 
they  lived.  In  the  bringing  about  of  these  reforms,  no 


152  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

man  had  been  more  instrumental  than  Wise,  and  from  the 
beginning  to  the  end  of  the  sessions  of  the  convention  he 
had  occupied  the  position  of  a  leader.  A  writer  of  the 
time,  in  the  Southern  Literary  Messenger,  in  describing  the 
members  of  the  convention,  thus  speaks  of  him :  — 

"  In  appearance  he  was  one  of  the  most  remarkable- 
looking  men  in  the  Assembly,  and  would  attract  attention 
wherever  seen.  His  face  seemed  full  of  cavities,  —  hollow 
cheeks,  large,  hollow  eye-sockets,  and  the  most  cavernous 
mouth;  when  he  spoke,  the  eyebrow  seemed  thrown  up 
toward  the  top  of  his  head,  and  his  mouth  immensely 
opened,  like  a  gate  on  its  hinges,  so  that  he  appeared  to 
be  all  eyes  and  all  mouth  —  two  very  good  features  in 
an  orator.  His  face  is  full  of  flexibility  and,  by  the  easy 
play  of  its  muscles,  expresses  every  emotion  and  passion  of 
the  mind.  In  fact,  the  whole  face  speaks  in  every  mus 
cle  and  fibre  of  it.  When  at  rest,  his  relaxed  features, 
tall,  loose-jointed  figure,  and  slight,  spare  form  give  no 
promise  of  physical  power ;  yet  the  length  and  frequency 
of  his  speech  and  his  earnest,  violent  gesticulation  show 
that  he  possesses  great  power  of  endurance.  From  out 
this  cavernous  mouth  flow  streams  of  eloquence ;  these 
hollow  eye-sockets  are  filled  up  with  the  blaze  of  the 
eye ;  and  the  very  flexibility  of  his  features  adds  force 
and  emphasis  to  his  words.  His  hazel  eye,  even  when 
quiet,  has  a  daring  outlook  that  well  expresses  the  char 
acter  of  the  man ;  and  in  his  excited  moments  it  blazed 
and  burned  in  the  fire  of  his  own  vehemence,  as  if  it 
would  consume  all  opposition  and  intimidate  all  resist 
ance.  His  action  is  always  abundant  and  is  of  the  most 
vehement  and  excited  character.  Totally  devoid  of  grace, 
which  his  loose,  angular  figure  forbids,  it  yet  possesses 
much  power  and  eccentric  force ;  his  use  of  the  long 
forefinger  reminds  us  of  Randolph,  and,  like  him,  he 


HIS   PERSONALITY    DESCRIBED  153 

excels  in  denunciation.  His  voice  is  the  most  perfect 
and  beautiful  feature  that,  as  an  orator,  he  possesses; 
it  is  at  once  powerful  and  sweet,  as  flexible  as  the  mus 
cles  and  features  of  his  face,  and  as  perfectly  under  con 
trol;  it  has  compass,  variety,  depth,  and  clearness,  and, 
besides  this,  it  has  that  peculiarity  of  sound  or  accent 
which  constitutes  the  winning  spell  of  the  orator  and 
which  so  effectually  charms  an  audience.  .  .  .  Mr.  Wise 
spoke  on  every  question  that  came  up,  and,  in  fact, 
scarcely  a  day  passed  that  he  did  not  have  something 
to  say.  His  greatest  speech  was  made  upon  the  Basis 
Question,  toward  the  close  of  the  debate  upon  that  sub 
ject  ;  he  was  five  days  in  delivering  it,  and  the  best  proof 
of  his  power  as  an  orator  was  shown  in  the  intense  interest 
with  which  his  long  speech  was  listened  to  by  the  people 
of  Richmond.  The  galleries  and  the  aisles  were  crowded 
with  an  interested  audience ;  the  members  of  the  conven 
tion  gave  up  their  chairs  to  the  ladies,  so  that  it  was  really 
a  mixed  assembly  of  citizens,  delegates,  and  ladies  before 
whom  he  spoke.  The  effect  of  his  speech  was  strikingly 
evident ;  and  if  the  true  test  of  an  orator  is  in  his  power 
to  convince  a  mixed  audience  of  the  truth  of  his  own 
opinions  and  to  carry  with  him  their  attention  and  their 
sympathies,  then  Henry  A.  Wise  is  one  of  the  most  elo 
quent  men  in  Virginia.  .  .  .  He  led  the  van  of  the 
western  party,  and  perhaps  contributed  more  than  any 
other  man  to  the  success  which  that  party  obtained.  It 
is  but  due,  however,  to  him  to  say  that  he  esteemed  this 
Basis  advantageous  to  the  east  as  well  as  to  the  west, 
and  hoped  that,  by  giving  power  into  the  hands  of 
western  men,  they  would  construct  lines  of  railroad  con 
necting  east  and  west,  and  thus  increase  the  population 
and  build  up  the  cities  of  tidewater  Virginia." 

During  the  long,  weary  months  through  which  the  con- 


154  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

vention  sat,  Wise  had  never  despaired  of  the  success  of 
the  principles  contended  for  by  him;  and  even  when 
many  of  the  western  members  had  abandoned  all  hope 
of  victory  and  talked  of  going  home,  he  had  stimulated 
their  drooping  spirits  and  urged  a  continuance  of  the 
struggle.  After  securing  the  passage  of  the  clause  pro 
viding  for  manhood  suffrage  and  a  new  apportionment 
of  representation,  Wise,  in  justice  to  his  own  constitu 
ents  and  the  eastern  party  generally,  led  the  struggle  for 
equality  in  taxation,  in  order  to  protect  the  residents  of 
eastern  Virginia  from  excessive  taxes  levied  on  slave 
property.  The  new  constitution  provided  that  taxation 
should  be  equal  and  uniform,  and  all  other  property  than 
slaves  should  be  taxed  in  proportion  to  its  value ;  also 
that  every  slave  who  had  attained  the  age  of  twelve  years 
should  be  assessed  with  a  tax  equal  to  and  not  exceeding 
that  assessed  on  land  of  the  value  of  three  hundred  dol 
lars.  This  provision,  save  as  regards  the  amendment 
excepting  slaves  under  twelve  years  of  age,  was  drawn 
by  Wise  and  passed  largely  through  his  influence,  in 
order  to  prevent  any  misuse  of  their  newly  gained  power 
by  the  west. 


CHAPTER  XI 

THIRD  MARRIAGE.  OPINION  OF  OLD  BACHELORS.  ADDRESS 
BEFORE  THE  VIRGINIA  COLONIZATION  SOCIETY.  "AFRICA 
GAVE  TO  VIRGINIA  A  SAVAGE  AND  A  SLAVE,  VIRGINIA 
GIVES  BACK  TO  AFRICA  A  CITIZEN  AND  A  CHRISTIAN!" 
VIEWS  IN  REGARD  TO  THE  NEGRO  AND  SLAVERY.  DELEGATE 
TO  THE  NATIONAL  DEMOCRATIC  CONVENTION  OF  1852 

DURING  the  sessions  of  the  Constitutional  Convention 
in  the  autumn  of  1850,  Wise  had  lost  his  second  wife,  who 
died  suddenly,  at  home,  while  he  was  in  Richmond,  in 
attendance  upon  the  Convention. 

In  November,  1853,  he  was  married  a  third  time  to  Miss 
Mary  Elizabeth  Lyons  of  Richmond,  a  sister  of  James 
Lyons,  Esq.,  a  prominent  lawyer  of  that  city.  From  the 
frequency  of  his  matrimonial  ventures  it  may  be  rightfully 
inferred  that  he  was  an  advocate  of  the  married  state; 
and  in  one  of  his  speeches  on  the  floor  of  Congress  he  had 
said :  "  Mr.  Speaker,  there  is  a  certain  class  of  men  who, 
put  them  where  you  will,  in  any  situation  in  life,  will  pid 
dle  —  I  mean  old  bachelors  !  I  never  will  henceforth  sup 
port  any  man  for  the  presidency  who  will  appoint  a 
bachelor  to  any  office  of  honor  or  profit,  and  especially 
of  responsibility.  An  old  bachelor,  sir,  is  a  '  withered  fig 
tree,'  he  is  a  '  vis  inertiee.'  Old  bachelors  are  too  near  akin 
to  old  maids  ! " 

For  the  next  two  years,  after  his  service  in  the  Consti 
tutional  Convention,  Wise  remained  quietly  at  home  in 

155 


156  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

Accomack,  not  participating  in,  but  an  interested  observer 
of,  public  affairs.  At  that  time  he  was  filled  with  gloomy 
forebodings  in  regard  to  the  antislavery  agitation,  which 
he  believed  would  end  in  bloodshed,  and  a  disruption  of 
the  Union.  During  the  month  of  January,  1850,  he  de 
livered  an  address  before  the  members  of  the  legislature 
in  Richmond,  in  which  he  said,  "  Our  only  safety  now 
lies  in  bold,  manly,  united  resistance,  firm,  concentrated, 
dignified,  and  determined  action."  He  urged  the  necessity 
of  preparation  on  the  part  of  the  South,  for  events  which 
were  casting  their  shadows  before.  Of  Wise's  views  on 
the  general  subject  of  negro  slavery,  a  fairly  correct  idea 
can  be  formed  from  an  impromptu  address  delivered  by 
him  before  the  Virginia  Colonization  Society,  at  Rich 
mond,  January  10,  1838,  as  these  views  were  substan 
tially  those  entertained  by  him,  up  to  the  time  of  the 
war. 

In  the  course  of  his  speech  he  said :  — 

"  The  abolition  society  denounces  slavery  as  a  sin;  sum 
mons  the  abstract  principles  of  right  and  justice,  and  an 
imaginary  law  of  Heaven,  to  destroy  the  most  holy  obliga 
tions  of  political  right  and  justice,  founded  upon  consti 
tutional  compact  among  men ;  appeals  to  prejudices  and 
passions  the  most  dangerous,  because  most  fanatical,  to 
release  a  portion  of  mankind  from  an  alleged  cruel  and 
oppressive  bondage ;  inflames  and  agitates  the  public  mind, 
by  threatening  to  demolish  all  established  social  relations ; 
arouses  a  religious  zeal  in  a  crusade  against  the  peace  and 
order  and  union  of  a  nation ;  teaches  and  preaches  insur 
rection  to  the  slave;  encourages  lynch-law,  and  hallows 
the  victims  of  its  penalties  with  the  glory  of  martyrdom ; 
calumniates  and  curses  the  slaveholder;  hurls  its  incen 
diarism  against  his  life ;  attacks  and  attempts  to  render 
unsafe  the  institution  of  slavery,  and  thereby  tightens  the 


THE   COLONIZATION   SOCIETY  157 

fetters  of  the  slave  and  makes  his  chains  more  galling; 
opposes  the  colonization  of  the  freeman  of  color  in  a  land 
where  the  black  man  may  be  the  fellow  of  man,  and  ad 
vances  the  horrible  amalgamation  here  in  the  land  of 
his  degradation,  with  those  to  whom  his  mere  associa 
tion  is  contamination  the  most  abhorrent  and  revolting! 
The  Colonization  Society  sacredly  regards  slavery  as  a 
civil  institution  of  the  country,  which,  upon  the  principle 
of  the  lesser  yielding  to  the  greater  good,  cannot  be 
attacked  by  the  law  of  humanity,  and  must  necessarily  be 
tolerated  and  sustained  from  motives  and  reasons  of  policy ; 
defends  all  the  eternal  and  immutable  principles  of  right, 
and  religiously  promotes  the  obvious  decrees  of  Heaven, 
whilst  it  faithfully  obeys  the  paramount  laws  of  the  State  ; 
appeals  to  the  reason  and  enlightened  consciences  of  men, 
and  to  that  calm  and  peaceful  religion  which  ever  right 
eously  interposes  to  ameliorate  the  various  conditions  of 
all  men,  and  which  wisely  wins  the  powerful  to  assist  the 
weak  —  the  unbound,  the  bound;  hushes  the  din  of  dis 
cord,  and  by  a  charm  preserves  our  peace  by  reconciling 
our  moral  duties  with  our  social  and  political  rights  and 
interests ;  invokes  the  love  of  union ;  teaches  and  preaches 
obedience  to  servants ;  supports  the  majesty  of  the  laws 
by  respecting  public  sentiment,  and  classes  all  the  dis 
turbers  of  the  public  peace  together,  inspires  the  slave 
holder  with  confidence,  and  addresses  itself  alone  to  his 
affections ;  removes  the  enemies  of  his  peace  and  safety ; 
guards  and  renders  safe  the  title  of  his  property  and  its 
enjoyment,  and  thereby  obtains  for  the  slave  the  indul 
gences  which  the  slackened  cord  of  confidence  yields 
without  cause  or  fear;  incidentally  facilitates  volun 
tary  emancipation,  by  sloughing  off  the  free  colored 
population  always  in  the  way  of  freedom  to  the  slave ; 
strengthens  and  upholds  the  friends  of  the  slaveholder 


158  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY  A.  WISE 

where  he  needs  friends  most,  where  there  are  no  ties  and 
associations  of  slavery  to  plead  for  the  institution,  and 
where  in  the  North  it  is  a  sword  to  pierce  abolition; 
and,  above  all  these  special  benefits,  its  great  aim  is  that 
which  makes  the  grandeur  of  this  cause  rise  to  sublimity  — 
to  make  light  shine  out  of  darkness,  to  colonize  a  nation  of 
freemen  in  their  fatherland  out  of  our  kitchens  of  slaves. 

"Yes,  sir,  the  existence  and  operation  of  abolition  but 
add  to  the  special  benefits  of  colonization.  It  not  only 
renders  the  institution  of  slavery  secure  at  home  among 
ourselves,  but  it  grants  the  only  ground  on  which  our 
friends  can  stand  in  the  non-slaveholding  States  among 
our  enemies  who  are  daily  multiplying  in  numbers  and 
increasing  in  power.  But,  sir,  I  repeat  that  the  special 
benefits  of  this  cause  to  this  nation  are  nothing  compared 
with  its  general  benefits  to  all  mankind,  to  all  posterity,  to 
Africa,  to  the  world.  In  contemplating  the  vast,  ultimate 
design  and  effects  of  this  great  scheme  of  lighting  up  a 
whole  land  now  shrouded  in  the  blackness  of  darkness,  I 
have  often  been  struck  with  the  thought  which  justifies 
slavery  itself  in  the  abstract,  and  which  has  made  me 
wonder  and  adore  a  gracious  special  Providence.  Ay, 
sir,  a  special  Providence  —  bad  a  man  as  some  may  have 
been  taught  to  believe  me  to  be  —  I,  sir,  even  I  do  firmly 
if  not  faithfully,  intellectually  if  not  religiously,  believe  in 
a  great  and  good  overruling  special  Providence.  And,  sir, 
I  as  firmly  believe  that  slavery  on  this  continent  is  the  gift 
of  Heaven  to  Africa.  Is  it  unworthy  of  the  divine  purpose 
or  impious  to  suppose  that  it  was  by  God  intended  to  be 
the  sun  of  the  illumination  of  that  land  of  night?  Cannot 
one  well  see  the  hand  of  the  everlasting  Almighty  who 
worketh  not  in  a  day  or  generation,  in  making  one  gener 
ation  serve  for  another  of  the  same  people  f  Is  there  aught 
religiously  wrong  in  making  an  idolatrous  pagan  sire  work 


AN   ADDRESS   BEFORE   THE   SOCIETY  159 

out  the  civilization  and  Christianity  of  a  son  f  What  mortal 
can  say  that  the  slavery  of  the  sire  was  not  divinely  in 
tended  to  be  the  consideration  —  and  is  it  anything  more 
than  a  fair  equivalent  —  for  the  arts  of  life  and  the  lights 
of  truth  to  his  posterity  ?  Africa  gave  to  Virginia  a  savage 
and  a  slave  ;  Virginia  gives  back  to  Africa  a  citizen  and  a 
Christian.  Against  which  does  the  balance  lie?  If  this 
was  not  the  divine  will,  let  those  who  object  tell  me,  how 
came  African  slavery  here?  Sir,  it  is  a  mystery  if  not 
thus  explained.  When  our  fathers  landed  on  the  shores 
of  my  venerable  district,  did  they  find  a  population  fair  as 
the  forests  of  the  land?  Who  roamed  those  forests?  Were 
they  too  not  savages,  ignorant,  rude,  barbarous,  and  un 
civilized  as  the  negro  of  Guinea's  coast?  Were  they  not 
as  fit  for  slavery  f  Did  not  the  war  of  massacre,  of  toma 
hawk  and  scalping-knife,  give  the  fairest  pretext  for  slavery 
by  the  right  of  capture  and  subjugation?  Boast  as  we  may 
of  the  royal  race  of  aborigines  who  lorded  it  over  this 
domain,  —  of  the  kingly  Powhatan,  the  peerless  Poca- 
hontas,  —  the  common  Indians  of  North  America  were  just 
as  fit  for  slavery,  and  ready  here  at  hand,  as  the  savages 
of  Africa's  desert  strands,  —  they  were  enslaved  by  the 
Yankees.  Why,  then,  were  slaves  brought  three  thou 
sand  miles  across  the  ocean,  leaving  our  neighboring  tribes 
of  savages  untouched  by  yoke  or  chain  ?  Why  but  to  re 
turn  civilization  for  slavery  ?  Who  so  fit  to  be  the  pioneer 
of  civilization  in  Africa  as  the  black  man?  Its  light  ex 
pires,  has  always  gone  out  in  the  hand  of  the  white  man. 
And  what  will  the  civilization  of  Africa  not  do  in  the  end 
for  mankind,  for  the  world,  its  arts,  its  science,  its  com 
merce,  its  peace,  and  happiness,  and  for  freedom  ?  What 
new  fields  will  it  not  explore?  The  subject  is  vast  and 
unbounded.  I  say  then,  sir,  send  forth  your  missionaries 
with  light  and  love  to  the  land  of  night,  until  that  4  dry 


160  THE    LIFE    OF    HENRY    A.   WISE 

nurse  of  lions'  shall  become  the  nursery  of  arts,  and 
science,  and  civilization,  and  law,  and  order,  and  religion." 
During  the  year  1854  the  Rev.  Ne he miah  Adams  of  Boston, 
who  was  then  engaged  in  the  preparation  of  his  interesting 
book  entitled  "  A  South  Side  View  of  Slavery,"  wrote  to 
Wise  requesting  his  opinions  on  this  subject.  In  his  reply 
he  stated  that  he  did  not  consider  emancipation  desirable 
for  either  the  negroes  or  the  whites,  as  long  as  the  blacks 
were  to  remain  here,  and  that  the  amalgamation  of  the 
races  was  against  the  law  of  nature.  He  wrote  further 
that  he  had  emancipated  one  slave,  but  would  never  free 
another;  and  that  he  considered  the  race  fit  only  for  the 
patriarchal  state  of  a  Southern  plantation.  In  his  native 
county  of  Accomack,  from  which  he  wrote,  the  free  colored 
population  at  that  time  numbered  3295,  while  there  were 
4987  slaves ;  from  which  figures  it  will  be  seen  that  emanci 
pation  was  no  rare  thing  among  the  slave-owners.  Indeed, 
among  the  Methodists  especially,  which  denomination  was 
quite  numerous  on  the  peninsula,  the  habit  of  freeing  their 
slaves  was  often  practised.  But  it  cannot  be  said  that  the 
conduct  and  progress  of  the  free  negroes  afforded  much 
encouragement  to  the  advocates  of  this  plan ;  for  the  former 
were  as  a  rule  a  shiftless  class,  and  regarded  as  a  nuisance 
in  the  communities  where  they  resided.  In  Wise's  opinion, 
the  Virginia  negro  was  only  adapted  to  a  condition  of 
pupilage,  and  he  wrote,  "  I  have  seen  the  negro  from  my 
youth  upward  in  all  circumstances  and  I  know  that  his 
tendency,  if  left  to  himself,  is  constantly  back  toward 
barbarism."  Like  the  overwhelming  majority  of  Virginia 
planters,  he  was  a  kind  and  humane  master,  who  was  fond 
of  his  slaves  and  they  of  him.  There  was  little  in  the 
institution,  as  it  existed  in  Virginia,  to  excite  horror  or 
pity  for  the  condition  of  the  slaves ;  for  peculiar  as  was  the 
institution  in  its  relation  to  the  century  in  which  it  had 


HIS   OPINION   OF  THE  NEGRO  161 

survived,  as  has  been  truly  said,  it  was  even  more  so  in 
regard  to  the  people  among  whom  it  existed,  who  were  an 
eminently  humane  and  gentle  race,  among  whom  the  en 
nobling  influences  of  Christianity  had  been  felt  in  a  high 
degree.  As  regards  the  physical  condition  of  the  slaves,  it 
is  no  exaggeration  to  say  that  a  better  housed,  clothed, 
and  fed  peasant  class  probably  did  not  exist.  If  proof 
were  needed  of  the  truth  of  this  statement,  it  could  be 
found  in  the  rapid  increase  of  insanity  (formerly  un 
known),  and  the  enormous  growth  in  the  death  rate, 
among  the  negro  population  in  our  day.  But  while  he 
regarded  the  negro  as  totally  unfit  for  the  responsibilities 
of  freedom  and  citizenship,  he  was  not  blind  to  the  many 
good  qualities  of  the  race. 

"  With  white  officers,"  he  wrote  Adams,  "  I  would  fight 
a  regiment  of  them  against  any  foreign  troops  who  could 
land  on  our  shores.  They  are  faithful,  and  they  are  brave, 
and  more  disinterested  than  the  white  man.  They  are 
joyous  in  their  temperament,  and  patient,  as  their  nerves 
are  coarse  and  strong.  The  owners  love  their  race  and  its 
qualities  better  than  their  pseudo-friends  the  abolitionists 
do.  Every  adult  slave  around  me  has  half  a  pound  of  cured 
bacon  per  day,  corn  meal  without  stint  or  measure  of  allow 
ance,  scale  fish  in  season,  and  an  abundance  of  such  vege 
tables  as  they  prefer  planted  and  sown  for  them.  Besides 
this,  they  have  crops  of  their  own  which  they  sell  for  their 
own  use.  Not  one  of  them  who  is  industrious  can  fail  to 
have  two  or  three  dollars  a  month  to  spend.  They  have 
no  occasion  to  buy  anything  but  fine  clothes.  They  have 
their  rations  weekly  of  molasses,  coffee,  and  tobacco.  They 
are  not  allowed  to  work,  and  are  carefully  nursed,  when 
sick,  and  when  well  don't  average  ten  hours  of  labor  per 
day.  They  have  their  feast-days  and  holidays  and  enjoy 
them  more  than  the  whites  do.  Here  they  have  Easter 


162  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.   WISE 

and  Whitsuntide,  two  days,  a  week  after  harvest,  a  day  at 
August  Court,  three  or  four  days  each  during  the  camp- 
meeting  seasons  of  the  Methodist  Church,  to  which  they 
mostly  belong,  and  a  week  at  Christmas,  besides  the  half- 
days  of  Saturday  in  going  to  see  their  wives." 

Wise,  like  many  other  Southern  men,  regretted  that 
slave  labor  had  not  been  introduced  into  California,  where 
it  could  have  been  profitably  employed ;  and  which  would 
have  had  the  effect  of  diffusing  the  slave  population,  and 
thereby  encouraging  gradual  emancipation.  It  is  strange 
how  completely  this  latter  view  of  the  subject  was  ignored 
by  the  abolition  party,  for  though  it  was  true  that  slavery 
needed  an  "  outlet,"  and  that  to  prevent  its  spread  meant 
ultimate  extinction  in  the  older  slave  States,  yet  the  con 
verse  of  this  proposition  was  equally  true,  and  perhaps  the 
greatest  obstacle  to  peaceable  emancipation  was  the  fact 
that  the  slave  population  was  concentrated  in  one  section 
of  the  Union  only. 

In  the  spring  of  1850  Wise  was  chosen  as  the  delegate 
from  his  district  to  the  convention  called  that  year  at 
Nashville,  Tennessee,  to  consider  the  affairs  of  the  South. 
In  the  course  of  a  letter,  dated  May  18,  1850,  and  ad 
dressed  to  William  H.  Roy,  Esq.,  the  president  of  the  con 
vention  to  select  delegates,  he  explained  his  inability  to 
go  to  Nashville,  but  in  discussing  the  question  then  at 
issue  wrote :  "  I  never  weighed  and  never  will  weigh  —  no 
man  can  weigh  the  value  of  the  Union,  nor  count  the  cost 
of  its  dissolution.  I  abhor  the  man  who  would  deliber 
ately  impair  it  even  in  the  affection  of  the  people.  He  is 
a  traitor  to  the  best  bond  and  security  of  civil  liberty  who 
would  betray  its  safety  by  any  devised  snare  whatever. 
He  is  an  enemy  to  his  country  and  to  mankind  who  is  not 
sincere  in  these  times  upon  this  subject.  But  if  the  Con 
stitution  of  the  United  States  shall  be  nullified  by  a  major- 


TEMPORARY   RETIREMENT  163 

ity  doctrine  and  become  frittered  away,  by  the  awful 
pacification  of  compromises  upon  compromises,  the  Union 
will  no  longer  exist  as  it  was  formed  by  the  Adamses  and 
Shermans  and  Franklins  and  Hamiltons  and  Lees  and 
Randolphs  and  Madisons  and  Rutledges  of  the  Revolu 
tion;  it  will  cease  itself  to  be  a  compromise,  the  com 
promise  of  compromises  as  it  was  in  1789 ;  it  will  become 
the  absolutism  of  a  many-headed  monster  of  oppression, 
inequality,  and  dishonor  to  us,  and  we  will  be  obliged  to 
resist  it  as  our  fathers  did  'taxation  without  representa 
tion,'  or  lose  our  self-respect  and  the  respect  of  the  rest  of 
mankind  and  cease  to  be  a  free  people.  We  will  have 
then  to  exclaim  in  anguish  to  King  Majority  instead  of 
King  George  the  Third:  not  that  the  Union  shall  be  dis 
solved,  no,  never  !  But :  4  (rive  us  lack  the  Union  as  it  was 
formed,  in  its  compromise  of  the  Constitution,  in  its  domes- 
tic  tranquillity,  in  its  equality  of  rights,  in  its  equality  of 
burthens,  in  its  fraternity  and  freedom;  or,  give  us  peaceful 
separation,  or  take  the  consequences  of  revolution  ! ' ' 

During  the  period  following  the  Constitutional  Conven 
tion  of  1850-51,  Wise  had  withdrawn  from  public  life, 
although  he  at  one  time  thought  of  becoming  a  candidate 
for  the  legislature,  with  a  view  to  advocating  public  schools 
and  internal  improvements ;  and  he  was  also  urged  in  1853 
to  allow  his  name  to  be  brought  forward  as  a  candidate  for 
the  United  States  Senate,  but  declined  for  the  reason  that 
he  would  not  oppose  his  friend  R.  M.  T.  Hunter.  The 
subject  of  public  education  had  always  been  a  topic  in 
which  he  had  been  deeply  interested,  and  some  of  his 
addresses  to  the  people  of  the  eastern  shore  on  this  topic 
are  still  preserved.  In  the  spring  of  1852  he  attended  the 
State  Democratic  Convention  at  Richmond,  and  his  elo 
quent  address  before  that  body  made  him  the  central 
figure,  among  the  many  able  party  leaders  there  assem- 


164  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

bled.  He  was  also  chosen  a  delegate  to  the  National  Con 
vention  of  his  party,  which  met  at  Baltimore  in  June,  and 
along  with  the  remainder  of  the  Virginia  delegation  voted 
for  Buchanan  thirty-five  successive  times,  despite  his  opin 
ion  of  old  bachelors  previously  given.  After  the  thirty- 
fifth  ballot  the  delegation  withdrew  for  consultation,  and 
on  the  next  ballot  cast  their  vote  as  a  unit  for  Franklin 
Pierce,  whose  name  was  presented  by  them,  for  the  first 
time  to  the  Convention.  He  was  largely  instrumental  in 
determining  the  Virginians  upon  this  course  of  action. 
For  a  while  Pierce  received  no  new  accessions  of  strength 
worthy  of  note,  but  was  finally  nominated  on  the  forty- 
ninth  ballot.  Wise,  for  the  second  time,  was  made  an 
elector,  for  his  district,  and  did  his  part  in  promoting  the 
success  of  the  ticket.  The  political  conditions  which 
existed  in  Virginia,  in  the  year  1854,  and  the  position 
which  he  came  to  occupy,  with  regard  to  the  question 
which  then  divided  political  parties,  we  shall  relate  in  the 
chapter  following. 


CHAPTER  XII 

THE     VIRGINIA      CAMPAIGN     OF     1855.  THE      OVERTHROW      OF 

KNOW-NOTHINGISM  IN  THE  SOUTH.  "l  HAVE  MET  THE 
BLACK  KNIGHT  WITH  HIS  VISOR  DOWN  AND  HIS  SHIELD 
AND  LANCE  ARE  BROKEN " 

ALMOST  from  the  birth  of  the  American  Union,  the 
nativist  feeling  has  from  time  to  time  cropped  out,  as  was 
shown  by  the  enactment  of  a  law  by  the  Federalists  in 
1798,  making  fourteen  years'  residence  on  the  part  of  a 
foreigner  necessary  to  entitle  him  to  naturalization,  which 
length  of  residence  was  again  shortened  upon  the  triumph 
of  the  Democratic  party  several  years  later.  Following 
periods  of  great  immigration  the  sentiment  against  for 
eigners  has  been  invariably  aroused.  Closely  allied  to  it, 
though  distinct  from  it,  was  the  anti-Romanist  feeling 
which  had  always  been  entertained  by  a  considerable  num 
ber,  who  believed  the  teaching  of  the  Church  of  Rome  to 
be  inimical  to  the  safety  and  welfare  of  republican  institu 
tions.  Lafayette,  himself  a  Romanist,  and  who  had  fought 
for  the  independence  of  the  American  Colonies,  did  not 
give  utterance  to  an  opinion  peculiar  to  himself  alone, 
when  he  declared  that,  "  if  the  liberties  of  the  American 
people  are  ever  destroyed,  they  will  fall  by  the  hands  of 
the  Romish  clergy."  The  fact  that  the  great  majority  of 
immigrants  hailed  from  papist  countries  and  professed  the 
Romanist  faith,  resulted  in  a  fusing,  as  it  were,  of  the 
nativists  and  anti-papal  sentiment,  so  that,  after  the  decade 

165 


166  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

of  the  thirties  at  least,  the  two  ideas  may  be  treated  as 
practically  inseparable.  The  new  immigrants  settled  for 
the  most  part  in  the  cities,  and  hence  in  New  York,  Phil 
adelphia,  and  the  various  towns  occurred  the  riots,  dur 
ing  the  period  of  the  thirties  and  forties,  growing  out 
of  the  animosities  which  a  variety  of  causes  had  con 
tributed  to  engender  between  native  and  foreign-born 
citizens. 

Though  efforts  had  been  made  to  found  an  "  American," 
or  nativist  party,  yet  its  appearance  in  political  affairs  had 
been  short-lived,  and  the  movement  may  be  said  to  have 
languished,  until  the  fresh  impetus  to  immigration  fur 
nished  by  the  European  political  troubles  in  1848-50  once 
more  revived  with  renewed  vigor  the  nativist  sentiment, 
and  rioting  and  anti-Catholic  demonstrations  were  again 
resumed  in  different  parts  of  the  country. 

Some  time  during  the  year  1852,  a  secret  oath-bound 
fraternity  was  organized,  the  name  of  which  was  "The 
Sons  of  '76  or  The  Order  of  the  Star-Spangled  Banner." 
In  consequence  of  the  fact  that  its  real  name  and  purpose 
were  only  disclosed  to  those  of  its  members  who  had  taken 
the  higher  degrees,  the  members  ordinarily,  when  ques 
tioned  about  the  order,  replied,  "  I  don't  know,"  from 
which  circumstance  they  soon  came  to  be  dubbed  "  Know- 
nothings,"  which  has  continued  to  be  the  popular  designa 
tion  by  which  they  have  been  known  ever  since.  The 
new  order  declared  as  its  leading  principle  that  "  Ameri 
cans  must  rule  America,"  and  the  rapid  spread  of  its  or 
ganization  throughout  many  States  set  at  naught  the 
calculations  of  the  politicians,  who  found  themselves  con 
fronted  by  a  new  and  powerful  element,  hard  to  deal  with. 
As  a  distinguished  historian,  Professor  McMaster,  has 
written  of  it :  "  Highly  organized,  thoroughly  in  ear 
nest,  it  did  its  work  with  a  precision  of  movement  and  a 


THE   KNOW-NOTHINGS  167 

concert  of  action  hitherto  unknown  in  American  politics." 
The  passage  of  the  Kansas-Nebraska  bill  in  1854  resulted 
in  the  disruption  of  the  old  Whig  party  and  the  going  over 
of  a  large  body  of  Whigs  to  the  new  organization,  which 
that  year  carried  Massachusetts  and  Delaware  and  polled 
a  considerable  vote  in  New  York.  The  spread  of  the  new 
faith  throughout  the  Northern  States  was  most  rapid,  and 
there  was  much  in  its  creed  to  commend  it  to  the  good 
favor  of  the  people  of  the  South.  In  the  latter  section 
the  foreign  element  was  insignificant,  and  the  old-time 
Whigs,  who  could  not  be  induced  to  act  with  either  the 
Democratic  or  Republican  parties,  readily  availed  them 
selves  of  the  opportunity  to  identify  themselves  with  the 
new  party  group.  During  the  summer  of  1854  the  order 
is  said  to  have  been  first  introduced  into  Virginia,  and  the 
first  council  instituted  in  the  town  of  Charlottesville, 
strange  to  say,  almost  under  the  very  shadow  of  Monti- 
cello.  Though  the  Whigs  at  first  stoutly  denied  any 
abandonment  of  their  organization,  yet  in  a  short  while  the 
new  movement  had  practically  absorbed  the  main  body  of 
them,  who,  unwilling  to  embrace  the  antislavery  views  of 
the  Republican  party,  at  the  same  time  hated  the  very 
name  of  Jefferson,  and  would  have  voted  for  the  devil 
himself,  if  necessary  to  defeat  the  principles  and  aims  of 
Democracy.  The  American,  or  Know-nothing,  organiza 
tion  had  still  another  feature,  calculated  to  win  popular 
approval  in  the  South,  as  it  laid  claim  to  being  strictly 
national  in  sentiment  and  opposed  to  the  agitation  of  the 
slavery  question ;  and  with  the  accession  of  the  disbanded 
Whigs  and  a  body  of  ambitious  young  men,  who  were 
brought  into  prominence  by  the  new  adjustment  of  party 
lines,  the  movement  had  assumed  formidable  proportions 
throughout  the  South  before  the  end  of  1854. 

During  the  summer  of  that  year  a  committee  of  citizens 


168  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

of  Norfolk  County,  Virginia,  in  view  of  the  approaching 
gubernatorial  campaign  in  that  State,  addressed  a  number 
of  letters  to  various  men  prominent  in  political  affairs, 
calling  upon  them  to  give  their  views  concerning  the  new 
party  and  its  principles.  Among  these  were  William  Smith, 
Shelton  F.  Leake,  James  A.  Seddon,  John  Letcher,  and 
Wise.1  The  latter  replied  in  a  letter  of  considerable  length, 
giving  expression  to  his  views  with  no  uncertain  sound, 
and  in  a  tone  calculated  to  win  the  approval  of  the  De 
mocracy  of  the  State.  The  following  extract  from  the 
letter,  which  is  dated  "  Only,  near  Onancock,  Virginia, 
September  18,  1854,"  may  be  said  to  furnish  the  keynote 
of  his  views :  "  In  this  country,  at  this  time,  does  any 
man  think  anything  ?  Would  he  speak  anything  ?  Would 
he  write  anything?  His  mind  is  free,  his  person  is  safe, 
his  property  is  secure,  his  house  is  his  castle,  the  spirit  of 
the  law  is  his  bodyguard  and  his  house-guard ;  the  fate  of 
one  is  the  fate  of  all,  measured  by  the  same  common  rule 
of  right ;  his  voice  is  heard  and  felt  in  the  general  suffrage 
of  freemen ;  his  trial  is  in  open  court,  confronted  by  wit 
nesses  and  accusers ;  his  prison-house  has  no  secrets,  and 
he  has  the  judgment  of  his  peers ;  and  there  is  naught  to 
make  him  afraid,  so  long  as  he  respects  the  rights  of  his 
equals  in  the  eye  of  the  law.  Would  he  propagate  Truth  ? 
Truth  is  free  to  combat  Error.  Would  he  propagate  Error  ? 
Error  itself  may  stalk  abroad  and  do  her  mischief  and 
make  night  itself  grow  darker,  provided  Truth  is  left  free 
to  follow,  however  slowly,  with  her  torches  to  light  up 
the  wreck !  Why,  then,  should  any  portion  of  the  people 
desire  to  retire  in  secret,  and  by  secret  means  to  propagate 
a  political  thought,  or  word,  or  deed  by  stealth?  Why 
band  together,  exclusive  of  others,  to  do  something  which 
all  may  not  know  of  toward  some  political  end  ?  If  it  be 

1  See  Hambleton's  "  Virginia  Politics  in  1855,"  page  7. 


PROTEST   AGAINST   THE   ORDER  169 

good,  why  not  make  the  good  known  ?  Why  not  think  it, 
speak  it,  write  it,  act  it  out  openly  and  aloud?  Or,  is  it 
evil,  which  loveth  darkness,  rather  than  light?  When 
there  is  no  necessity  to  justify  a  secret  association  for 
political  ends,  what  else  can  justify  it?  A  caucus  may 
sit  in  secret  to  consult  on  the  general  policy  of  a  great 
public  party.  That  may  be  necessary  or  convenient;  but 
that  even  is  reprehensible,  if  carried  too  far.  But  here  is 
proposed  a  great  primary,  national  organization,  in  its  in 
ception  —  What  ?  Nobody  "knows.  How  organized  ?  No* 
body  knows.  Governed  by  whom  ?  Nobody  knows.  How 
bound  ?  By  what  rites  ?  By  what  test  oaths  ?  With  what 
limitations  and  restrictions  ?  Nobody,  nobody  knows !  !  !  ! 
All  we  know  is  that  persons  of  foreign  birth  and  of  Cath 
olic  faith  are  proscribed,  and  so  are  all  others  who  don't 
proscribe  them  at  the  polls.  This  is  certainly  against  the 
spirit  of  Magna  Charta."  In  conclusion  he  declared: 
"  I  belong  to  a  secret  society,  but  for  no  political  purpose. 
I  am  a  native  Virginian ;  intus  et  in  cute,  a  Virginian ;  my 
ancestors  on  both  sides  for  two  hundred  years  were  citizens 
of  this  country  and  this  State  —  half  English,  half  Scotch. 
I  am  a  Protestant  by  birth,  by  baptism,  by  intellectual  be 
lief,  by  education,  and  by  adoption.  I  am  an  American  in 
every  fibre,  and  in  every  feeling  an  American;  yet  in 
every  character,  in  every  relation,  in  every  sense,  with  all 
my  head  and  all  my  heart,  and  all  my  might,  I  protest 
against  this  secret  organization  of  native  Americans,  and 
of  Protestants  to  proscribe  Roman  Catholics  and  natural 
ized  citizens ! " 

On  the  30th  of  November,  1854,  the  delegates  repre 
senting  the  Democracy  of  the  State  assembled  in  conven 
tion  in  the  Methodist  Church,  in  the  town  of  Staunton, 
for  the  purpose  of  nominating  candidates  for  the  offices 
of  governor,  lieutenant-governor,  and  attorney-general,  to 


170  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

be  voted  for  at  the  following  spring  election.  The  names 
of  Wise  and  Shelton  F.  Leake  were  the  two  most  promi 
nently  discussed  for  the  position  of  governor,  and  the 
choice  had  narrowed  down  between  them.  Mr.  Leake  had 
served  as  a  member  of  the  State  legislature  and  of  Con 
gress,  and  as  lieutenant-governor  of  the  State,  and  was 
an  unfaltering  Democrat,  much  beloved  by  the  people  of 
the  Piedmont  section,  where  he  resided.  He  was  a  man 
of  acute  powers  of  mind,  a  speaker  of  unusual  adroitness 
and  force,  as  well  as  possessed  of  those  moral  character 
istics  which  command  admiration  and  respect.  He  may 
be  said  to  have  been  the  choice  of  the  Democrats  of  Pied 
mont  and  middle  Virginia,  while  Wise's  followers  hailed 
from  the  tidewater  country,  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  sec 
tion  west  of  the  mountains,  on  the  other  —  the  two  ex 
tremes  of  the  State.  The  latter's  record  on  the  questions 
of  the  basis  of  representation  and  internal  improvements, 
in  the  Constitutional  Convention  of  1850-51,  had  gained 
for  him  a  host  of  political  friends  in  the  transmontane 
section,  who  were  largely  instrumental  in  securing  for  him 
the  nomination  for  governor.  When  the  Convention  first 
met,  their  choice  of  a  candidate  seemed  involved  in  some 
doubt,  but  as  the  stage-coaches  rolled  in  from  the  moun 
tain  counties  the  followers  of  Wise  were  reenforced  by 
large  delegations,  who  insured  his  nomination.  Mr.  W.  R.  C. 
Douglas,  of  New  Kent  County,  presented  his  name  to 
the  Convention  and  among  those  who  seconded  the 
nomination  was  Dr.  Thomas  Dunn  English  of  Logan,  the 
author  of  "Ben  Bolt,"  who,  from  the  zeal  displayed  in 
behalf  of  his  candidate  during  the  exciting  debates  of  the 
body,  showed  himself  to  be  unlike  his  own  "  sweet  Alice," 

"  Who  wept  with  delight  when  you  gave  her  a  smile 
And  trembled  with  fear  at  your  frown !  " 


NOMINATED   FOR   GOVERNOR  171 

Wise  received  the  nomination  on  the  second  ballot, 
Elisha  W.  McComas  of  Kanawha  was  named  for  lieuten 
ant-governor,  and  Willis  P.  Bocock  of  Richmond  for 
attorney-general.  Hambleton,  in  his  history  of  the  cam 
paign  of  1855,  remarks  truly  that  "  no  candidate  ever  went 
before  the  people  for  any  office  under  more  discouraging 
circumstances  than  Mr.  Henry  A.  Wise."  Although  Vir 
ginia  was  ordinarily  a  safe  Democratic  State,  and  in  the 
preceding  gubernatorial  election  had  chosen  Joseph  John 
son,  the  candidate  of  that  party,  over  George  W.  Summers, 
the  Whig  nominee,  yet  at  the  outset  of  the  campaign  of 
1855  the  prospects  for  Democratic  success  were  far  from 
encouraging.  The  politicians,  as  a  rule,  had  been  un 
friendly  to  Wise  and  many  of  them  looked  with  favor 
upon  his  nomination  as  an  easy  means  of  getting  rid  of  a 
troublesome  man,  who  would  "  take  the  bit  in  his  teeth  " 
and  rush  on  to  certain  defeat.  Moreover,  not  only  had 
the  American  party  given  evidence  that  it  was  thoroughly 
organized  and  making  rapid  headway  throughout  the  State, 
but  Wise's  nomination  was  far  from  pleasing  to  hundreds 
of  Democrats  who  preferred  Leake  as  the  more  "  regular  " 
party  man.  The  fact  that  Wise  had  opposed  Jackson  in 
Congress  and  had  been  prominently  identified  with  the 
Whigs  was  not  forgotten,  and  many  criticised  his  political 
course  and  what  they  regarded  as  his  inconsistencies.  The 
friends  of  Mr.  Leake,  however,  were  loyal  in  their  sup 
port  of  Wise,  and  the  Richmond  Examiner,  which  had 
earnestly  remonstrated  against  the  nomination  of  the  lat 
ter,  contained  the  following  extract  in  one  of  its  issues  of 
December,  1854 :  — 

"  He  is  a  man  to  whom  we  have  never  felt  but  one  ob 
jection  personally,  and  that  was  that  though  as  sound  in 
politics  now  as  the  strictest  Republican  of  the  Virginia 
school,  his  course  had  been  inconsistent  and  his  record 


172  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

contradictory,  in  a  manner  and  to  a  degree  which  rendered 
it  difficult  for  the  party  speakers  and  writers  in  this  can 
vass  to  defend  him,  according  to  the  old  mode  of  party 
reasoning.  We  have  said  this  frequently  and  we  do  not 
mean  to  unsay  it  in  the  canvass  at  hand.  But  of  all  the 
claims  to  office,  those  of  the  mere  party  men  are  the  flim 
siest  and  most  wretched.  »  .  .  Honesty,  fidelity,  capacity 
—  the  Jefferson  tests  —  these,  at  last,  are  the  true  qualifi 
cations  for  office.  Consistency,  in  the  vulgar  acceptation, 
belongs  of  tener  to  the  demagogue  and  ignoramus  than  to 
the  honest  politician  and  the  capable  statesman.  Those 
high  personal  qualities  which  make  us  love,  admire,  and 
trust  in  men  belong  of  tener  to  the  rash,  impulsive,  and 
brave  than  to  the  cautious,  calculating,  and  consistent. 
If  you  judge  Mr.  Wise  by  the  acts  of  his  life,  we  admit 
that,  in  our  opinion,  he  has  few  claims  to  consistency. 
But  if  you  judge  him  by  the  impulses  of  his  nature  and 
the  fidelity  and  chivalric  bravery  of  his  adherence  to  them, 
the  verdict  in  his  favor  is  emphatic  and  beyond  question. 
The  political  horizon  is  filled  with  admonitions  of  trouble. 
The  recent  elections  at  the  North  reveal  a  state  of  feeling 
very  portentous  to  the  South.  We  are  upon  the  eve  of 
times  which  will  try  men's  souls.  Let  us  have  a  tried, 
brave,  true  Southern  man  in  the  executive  office  of  Vir 
ginia.  At  a  time  like  this,  let  us  look  to  the  metal  of  our 
men  rather  than  to  their  'records.'  The  Democracy  of 
Virginia  have  declared  at  Staunton  that  they  care  not  for 
political  antecedents  or  partisan  animosities,  twenty  years 
gone  by,  in  the  presence  of  the  danger  now  threatening 
the  South.  They  have  resolved  that  old  and  obsolete  dif 
ferences,  such  as  used  to  divide  them  from  their  political 
opponents  at  home,  are  not  to  be  remembered  against  the 
true  Southern  man  in  a  contest  upon  that  issue  —  North 
ern  aggression  against  Southern  rights. 


OPENING   THE   CAMPAIGN  173 

"There  is  significance  in  the  nomination  of  Mr.  Wise. 
The  Democracy  of  Virginia  have  resolved,  in  disregard  of 
past  domestic  animosities  and  old  differences  of  opinion, 
to  manifest  their  stern,  uncompromising  temper  on  the 
sectional  issue  by  the  man  they  mean  to  place  at  the  head 
of  affairs.  When  we  make  Henry  A.  Wise  governor  of 
Virginia,  the  North  will  know  what  we  mean." 

Shortly  after  the  Staunton  Convention,  Wise  arranged 
his  private  affairs  preparatory  to  entering  upon  the  cam 
paign,  and  on  the  5th  of  January,  1855,  opened  in  Norfolk 
the  most  brilliant  and  aggressive  canvass  that  has  ever 
occurred  in  the  history  of  the  State.  The  newspapers,  in 
describing  his  opening  speech,  tell  us  that  frequent  bursts 
of  applause  followed  his  "  sabre-like  flashes  of  eloquence," 
and  that  his  words  "  were  as  fire  that  ran  and  thrilled  the 
whole  audience."  An  admirer  of  Wise,  ex-Governor  Will 
iam  E.  Cameron,  thus  describes  him  at  this  period  :  — 

"  He  was  then  in  the  prime  of  life,  and  in  person,  manner, 
voice,  and  mental  equipment  the  ideal  leader  of  a  forlorn 
hope.  Elected  to  Congress  in  1833,  he  had,  by  lengthy 
service  in  that  body  and  by  intimate  association  with  the 
ruling  intellects  of  the  age,  acquired  knowledge  of  public 
affairs  and  a  readiness  in  debate  which  gave  the  fullest 
play  to  his  natural  powers  of  oratory.  Tall,  lithe,  yet 
muscular,  a  frame  of  steel,  knit  with  nerves ;  his  face, 
clean  shaven,  had  the  rigid  lines  of  a  classic  cameo,  but 
his  expression  varied  to  suit  his  rapid  moods  so  that  the 
auditor  could  almost  anticipate  his  words.  His  gesture 
was  eloquence  itself,  powerful,  yet  restrained.  His  com 
mand  of  language  was  unequalled  in  my  experience, 
though  from  Stephen  Douglas  to  Elaine,  I  have  heard  all 
the  famous  speakers  of  this  country.  .  .  .  His  voice,  too, 
had  the  compass  of  an  organ  pipe,  and  ranged  from  the 
persuasive  softness  of  a  lute  to  the  metallic  ring  of  the 


174  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

bugle  note.  Add  to  all  this  the  magnetism  which  defies 
analysis,  which  forces  other  men  to  listen  and  then  com 
pels  them  to  believe ;  a  courage  as  uncalculating  as  that 
of  a  sea-hawk ;  a  strength  of  conviction  as  absolute  as  ever 
sustained  a  martyr  at  the  stake;  and  there  you  have  an 
imperfect  portrait  of  the  man  who  flung  himself  single- 
handed  against  an  epidemic  of  fanaticism,  and  won  the 
fight.  For  after  the  election  the  '  dark  lantern '  lost  its 
magic  and  the  'culvert'  its  attractiveness."  The  model  of 
a  campaign  speaker  and  a  master  of  invective,  Wise  was 
in  every  way  fitted  to  strike  terror  to  the  hearts  of  the 
members  of  the  new  secret  order,  and  from  the  Chesapeake 
to  the  banks  of  the  Ohio  and  to  the  Tennessee  line,  he 
canvassed  the  State,  delivering  speeches  of  impassioned 
eloquence  and  convincing  logic.  Everywhere  enormous 
crowds  greeted  him  with  unbounded  enthusiasm  and  peo 
ple  rode  on  horseback  fifty  miles  across  the  mountains  to 
hear  him." 

Early  in  the  campaign  the  Democratic  State  Committee 
of  Indiana  forwarded  to  Wise  a  copy  of  the  "  Know-noth 
ing  "  ritual  and  charter,  which  they  had  procured  and  of 
which  the  latter  made  free  use  during  his  canvass  to  the 
discomfiture  of  his  political  enemies,  who  would  greet  his 
disclosure  upon  the  stump  with  catcalls,  groans,  hisses, 
and  other  noisy  demonstrations.  His  Democratic  fol 
lowers  would  laugh  heartily,  too,  when  he  quoted  the 
words  of  Job :  "  For  we  are  but  of  yesterday,  and  Know 
nothing"  There  is  every  reason  to  believe  that  not  only 
was  the  American  or  Know-nothing  order  powerfully  or 
ganized  in  Virginia  in  1855,  but  in  addition,  that  had 
that  party  confined  itself  to  the  issue  of  "  Americans  must 
rule  America,"  the  restriction  of  immigration  and  revision 
of  the  naturalization  laws,  it  would  have  achieved  a  sweep 
ing  victory.  While  it  is  true  that  the  foreign  population 


THE  KNOW-NOTHINGS'  ERROR  175 

of  Virginia  at  that  time  was  not  over  two  or  three  per 
cent  at  the  most,  and  there  was  no  friction  engendered 
between  the  natives  and  the  foreigners,  as  in  the  North 
where  there  had  been  large  immigrations,  yet  the  people 
of  Virginia,  despite  the  further  fact  that  not  only  the 
English  but  the  Scotch-Irish,  Huguenot,  and  German  blood 
entered  into  their  own  race  elements,  were,  in  the  main, 
essentially  homogeneous  in  character,  as  compared  with 
the  States  to  the  northward,  and  not  inclined  to  favor  any 
commingling  of  the  various  foreign  elements  with  their  own 
people.  There  were,  moreover,  many  who  noted  the  fact 
that  the  immigrants  settled  almost  entirely  in  the  North 
ern  and  Western  States,  and  contributed  to  swell  the  bal 
ance  against  the  South  with  which  section  Virginia,  on 
account  of  the  problems  growing  out  of  the  institution 
of  slavery,  was  more  nearly  identified.  On  the  12th  of 
December,  1854,  the  Examiner ^  a  leading  Democratic 
organ  of  the  State,  and  edited  at  the  time  by  Robert  W. 
Hughes,  said  editorially:  " Know-nothingism  is  partially 
right.  American  citizenship  ought  not  to  be  made 
dirt  cheap.  The  sovereignty  of  this  Republic  is  in  the 
people ;  and  every  vagabond  adventurer  escaping  from 
the  jails,  and  packed  off  from  the  poorhouses  of  Europe, 
is  not  fit  for  sovereign  citizenship  in  this  country  the 
moment  his  dirty  rags  and  stinking  carcass  touch  our 
shores.  There  is  not  a  sensible  citizen  and  patriot  in  the 
Union  who  will  deny  that  the  naturalization  laws  do  need 
reformation ;  and  no  party  in  the  country,  be  it  ever  so 
strong,  veteran,  and  disciplined,  can  sustain  itself  upon  an 
issue  in  favor  of  these  laws  as  they  stand.  Jacobinical 
organization,  however,  is  not  necessary  to  the  required 
reform,  and  is,  besides,  at  war  with  all  the  essential  prin 
ciples  of  popular  government.  Religious  proscription,  too, 
is  more  prolific  of  the  seeds  of  social  disrupture  than  for- 


176  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY  A.  WISE 

eignism  in  its  most  aggravated  and  offensive  form."  The 
views  expressed  by  the  Examiner  were  widely  held 
throughout  the  Southern  States  and  Von  Hoist,  who 
rarely  has  a  kind  word  for  that  section,  in  his  "  Constitu 
tional  History  of  the  United  States"  (Vol.  V.,  page  190), 
in  alluding  to  the  fact  that  in  Alabama,  Georgia,  Louisi 
ana,  and  South  Carolina  the  party  had  been  forced  to 
abandon  its  more  objectionable  features,  remarks:  "It 
does  the  South  no  small  honor  that  there  the  party  had  to 
agree  to  give  up  its  secrecy  and  its  oaths,  as  it  had  already 
previously  been  forced  there  to  make  concessions  in  regard 
to  the  Catholics."  In  Virginia,  while  the  various  councils 
of  the  order  had  been  organized  in  conformity  with  the 
same  ritual  and  usages  in  force  throughout  the  Northern 
States,  yet  the  secret  oaths  and  anti-Catholic  features 
were  always  obnoxious  to  the  character  and  genius  of  her 
people. 

Protestant  to  the  core,  and  in  many  respects  narrow- 
minded  and  intolerant,  yet  her  people  had  not  forgotten 
the  principles  of  religious  freedom  promulgated  by  George 
Mason  in  1776  in  his  immortal  bill  of  rights,  and  later  by 
Jefferson  in  his  Statutes  of  Religious  Liberty.  They  pos 
sessed,  moreover,  that  personal  manliness  and  individuality 
which  probably  attain  their  highest  development  among 
a  country  gentry,  and  the  subordinating  of  their  will  and 
thoughts  to  a  secret,  oath-bound  organization  was  in  every 
respect  opposed  to  their  temperament  and  ideas  of  the 
proper  conduct  of  government.  It  is  worthy  of  note  that 
while  in  almost  all  of  the  larger  towns  of  the  State,  includ 
ing  Richmond  and  Norfolk,  the  Know-nothings  triumphed 
over  their  Democratic  opponents,  yet  the  majorities  gained 
in  the  cities  were  more  than  offset  by  the  country  voters, 
who  were  more  conservative  in  character  and  tenacious 
of  the  principles  taught  by  the  fathers  of  the  Republic. 


SPREAD   OF   THE   KNOW-NOTHINGS  177 

General  John  D.  Imboden,  who  was  prominently  identi 
fied  with  the  American  party  in  Virginia,  in  an  article  l 
published  shortly  before  his  death,  wrote :  "  Its  [the 
American  party's]  main  purpose,  which  was  to  require 
a  twenty-one  years'  residence  of  all  foreigners  before  full 
naturalization  and  the  right  to  vote,  met  with  the  hearty 
support  of  nearly  all  the  old  Whigs  in  the  South,  —  and 
many  Democrats,  —  but  the  anti-Catholic  feature  was  so 
generally  condemned,  as  contrary  to  our  fundamental  law, 
that  in  Virginia,  at  least,  it  was  insisted  that  no  religious 
test  to  vote,  or  hold  office,  should  ever  be  made,  and  a 
movement  was  put  on  foot  to  hold  a  national  council  and 
strike  that  odious  clause  out  of  the  party  creed,  as  well 
as  to  abolish  secrecy,  and  to  plant  the  party  simply  on 
a  denial  of  full  citizenship  to  any  adult  immigrant  under 
twenty-one  years'  residence."  On  the  19th  of  October, 
1855,  some  months  after  the  gubernatorial  election  had 
been  decided,  the  American  or  Know-nothing  party  met 
in  convention  at  Lynchburg,  and  to  its  credit,  be  it  said, 
a  resolution  was  passed,  with  but  one  dissenting  vote, 
counselling  the  abandonment  "  of  the  ceremonies  of  initi 
ation,  the  oaths,  signs,  secrets,  and  passwords  " ;  and  in 
addition,  another  resolution  inviting  into  the  organization 
all  men  "who  profess  to  owe  no  temporal  allegiance  to 
any  foreign  power  "  ;  this  last  being  regarded  as  an  aban 
donment  of  the  Catholic  test. 

At  the  commencement  of  the  canvass  of  1855  all  the 
signs  of  the  times  seemed  to  point  to  the  triumph  of  the 
Know-nothing  party,  as  it  was  spreading  with  remarkable 
rapidity  throughout  the  State,  and  as  previously  stated 
had  won  a  valuable  accession  to  its  ranks  in  the  absorption 
of  the  Whigs,  who,  on  account  of  their  numbers  and  pres- 

1See  letter  signed  "A  Grandfather"  in  the  Richmond  Times  of 
August  25,  1895. 


178  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

tige,  constituted  the  chief  strength  of  the  new  party. 
Indeed,  the  Whigs  at  that  time  arrogated  to  themselves 
the  larger  share  of  the  blue  blood  of  the  Commonwealth, 
and  it  is  related  of  John  Syme,  the  editor  of  the  Peters 
burg  Intelligencer,  that  when  asked  whether  or  not  a 
Democrat  was  a  gentleman  he  was  wont  to  tap  his  snuff 
box  significantly,  and  reply :  "  Well,  he  is  apt  not  to  be ; 
but  if  he  is  he  is  in  damned  bad  company." 

The  Whig  gentry  had  counted  on  the  certain  defeat  of 
their  old  opponents,  and  were  surprised  to  find  Wise,  in 
stead  of  remaining  quietly  at  home,  going  among  the 
people  and  delivering  speeches  of  telling  effect.  The 
spectacle  of  a  candidate  for  governor  uon  the  stump" 
was  a  novel  one  in  Virginia ;  for,  prior  to  the  adoption  of 
the  new  constitution  in  1851,  the  chief  executive  of  the 
State  was  chosen  by  the  legislature,  and  with  the  excep 
tion  of  George  W.  Summers,  who  had  been  the  Whig 
nominee  in  1851,  no  gubernatorial  aspirant  had  ever  before 
canvassed  for  that  office.  Wise's  eloquence,  however, 
stirred  the  enthusiasm  of  the  Democratic  masses,  and  he 
possessed  in  a  remarkable  degree  the  ability  to  electrify 
and  thrill  an  audience  and  overpower  his  opponents. 
Never  before  had  a  speaker  on  the  hustings  in  Virginia 
kindled  such  a  spirit  of  admiration  among  his  followers, 
or  met  with  such  opposition  from  the  rival  party.  Politi 
cal  feeling  was  intense,  and  party  spirit  held  full  sway. 
Despite  the  effect  of  Wise's  oratory  and  bitter  denuncia 
tion  of  the  new  order,  had  the  election  been  held  a  few 
months  earlier  the  Democratic  flag  would  probably  have 
gone  down  in  defeat. 

On  the  14th  of  March,  1855,  more  than  three  months 
after  the  Democratic  convention  held  at  Staunton,  and 
while  Wise  was  in  the  midst  of  his  canvass,  representatives 
of  the  American  organization  assembled  in  secret  meeting 


THE   NOMINATION    OF    FLOURNOY  179 

at  Winchester,  for  the  purpose  of  nominating  a  State 
ticket.  "Never  before  in  the  history  of  Virginia,"  says 
Hambleton,  in  his  "  Narrative  of  the  Campaign,"  "  did  any 
party  for  the  purpose  named  assemble  in  privacy  and 
secrecy  to  make  a  State  nomination.  .  .  .  Who  were  there 
and  what  was  said  and  done  in  all  human  probability  will 
never  be  known  to  the  generation  now  in  existence. 
There  could  be  nothing  discovered  by  examining  the 
registers  of  the  hotels,  for  the  delegates  used  fictitious 
names  in  recording  themselves."  As  a  result  of  the  Win 
chester  convention,  or  rather  conference,  for  it  was  a 
gathering  of  a  few  party  leaders  only,  Thomas  Stanhope 
Flournoy  of  Halifax  was  nominated  as  the  American  can 
didate  for  governor,  James  M.  H.  Beale  of  Mason  for 
lieutenant-governor,  and  John  M.  Patton  of  Richmond 
for  attorney-general.  Mr.  Flournoy  was  a  resident  of  the 
good  old  county  of  Halifax,  where  he  had  risen  into  promi 
nence  as  a  lawyer,  in  a  circuit  noted  for  its  brilliant  bar. 
He  had  known  and  ridden  to  court  when  a  boy  with  John 
Randolph  of  Roanoke,  who  was  an  intimate  friend  of  his 
father,  and  throughout  his  life  delighted  in  relating 
many  interesting  reminiscences  of  the  eccentric  Virginian. 
From  the  outset  of  his  career,  Mr.  Flournoy  had  been  a 
stanch,  old-line  Whig,  and  his  political  views  had  brought 
him  into  intimate  association  with  Judge  William  Leigh, 
the  Braces,  Chalmers,  Banks,  Barksdales,  and  other  lead 
ing  Whigs  of  his  county  and  State.  Shortly  after  coming 
to  the  bar,  he  had  been  selected  by  his  friends  as  the  Whig 
candidate  for  the  legislature  from  Halifax,  his  Democratic 
opponent  being  John  R.  Edmunds,  a  personal  friend  and 
young  man  of  about  the  same  age.  The  campaign  between 
these  two  youthful  aspirants  for  political  honors  was 
opened  by  a  joint  debate  between  them,  at  a  cross-road 
precinct,  in  the  back  country.  Flournoy  prepared  himself 


180  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.   WISE 

for  the  occasion  by  donning  his  best  suit  of  broadcloth, 
whereupon  he  mounted  a  fine  horse  and  rode  over  to  the 
scene  of  action.  It  is  related  of  him  that  he  was  con 
siderably  disconcerted  when,  a  little  later  on,  after  the 
sovereigns  had  gathered  in  large  numbers,  he  saw  his 
opponent  ride  up,  clad  in  a  homespun  suit,  with  stitch- 
down  shoes,  seated  astride  a  wagon  saddle  on  a  plough 
horse,  looking  as  if  he  had  just  taken  the  animal  from  the 
furrow,  to  repair  to  the  place  of  the  coming  forensic  contest. 
It  is  said  that  Flournoy  advanced  to  where  Edmunds  was 
standing,  surrounded  by  an  admiring  group,  and  inquired, 
"  Edmunds,  what  upon  earth  do  you  mean  by  coming  here 
in  such  a  plight  ?  "  "  Oh ! "  said  Edmunds,  "  I  leave  fine 
dressing  to  you  gentlemen  of  the  law ;  but  I  belong  to  the 
4  bone  and  sinew '  of  the  country,  and  don't  care  for  it.  I 
am  a  plain  farmer,  like  most  of  these  worthy  friends  of 
mine,  and  I  prefer  to  dress  as  they  do."  Although  Flour 
noy  carried  off  the  honors  of  the  debate,  it  is  needless  to 
add  that  Edmunds  went  to  the  legislature.  But  if  we 
have  unintentionally  conveyed  the  impression  from  this 
little  anecdote  of  his  early  life  that  Mr.  Flournoy  was  at 
all  haughty  or  exclusive  in  his  bearing,  we  would  hasten 
to  correct  it  here ;  for  few  men  were  more  approachable,  or 
simple  in  their  manners.  As  an  admirer  and  fellow-coun- 
tyman  the  Rev.  John  Cosby  has  written  of  him :  "  His 
popularity,  like  Henry  Clay's,  was  of  a  personal  character. 
Men  were  Whigs  because  they  loved  Flournoy,  and  many 
old  Democrats  loved  him  in  spite  of  his  Whiggism,  and 
rejoiced  in  his  forensic  success.  He  has  often  told  me  he 
never  had  to  spend  a  dollar  for  electioneering  purposes. 
Houses  were  everywhere  open  to  him,  and  his  party  friends 
were  his  zealous  personal  friends,  and  championed  his 
cause  with  all  their  might  and  means."  Although  the 
district  in  which  he  lived  was  Democratic  by  a  large 


THE  CANDIDATE  OF  THE   AMERICAN   PARTY        181 

majority,  Mr.  Flournoy  was  elected  to  Congress  in  1846, 
by  dint  of  his  able  canvass  and  personal  popularity,  and 
in  the  succeeding  congressional  election  was  only  defeated 
by  nine  votes,  though  the  Democrats  of  the  district  put 
forth  their  best  efforts  to  defeat  him.  While  in  Congress, 
Mr.  Flournoy  made  the  acquaintance  of  Abraham  Lincoln, 
and  a  lasting  friendship  sprang  up  between  the  two. 
Flournoy  was  sent  from  his  county,  along  with  James  C. 
Bruce,  as  a  member  of  the  Virginia  convention  of  1861, 
where  he  stood  as  a  stanch  Union  man,  until  Lincoln's 
call  for  troops,  when  he  acquiesced  in  the  action  of  that 
body  and  returned  to  his  home  enlisting  in  the  Confed 
erate  army,  where  he  served  with  gallantry.  After  the 
downfall  of  the  Southern  cause  at  Appomattox,  Mr. 
Flournoy  received  a  letter  from  Mr.  Lincoln,  containing 
warm  expressions  of  personal  regard  and  asking  his  aid 
in  the  proposed  effort  of  the  latter  to  restore  the  Southern 
States  to  their  former  status  in  the  Union. 

Mr.  Flournoy  was  a  speaker  of  great  fervor  and  elo 
quence,  as  well  as  a  man  well  versed  in  public  affairs,  and 
this,  together  with  his  popularity  with  the  Whigs,  had  led  to 
his  nomination  by  the  Winchester  convention,  as  the  can 
didate  of  the  American  party  in  1855,  for  governor  of  the 
State,  although  the  honor  was  not  of  his  seeking  and  con 
ferred  against  his  protest.  Additional  interest  would 
have  been  added  to  the  campaign,  had  Flournoy  and 
Wise  met  in  joint  debate ;  but  in  accordance  with  the 
policy  determined  upon  by  his  party,  the  former  did  not 
appear  upon  the  hustings.  Despite  the  feeling  engen 
dered  by  the  political  excitement,  the  friendship  existing 
between  the  two  candidates  was  in  no  manner  inter 
rupted,  and  they  continued  warm  friends  through  life. 
Mr.  Beale,  the  American  candidate  for  lieutenant-gov 
ernor,  it  was  thought  would  add  strength  to  the  ticket  in 


182  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

the  western  portion  of  the  State,  from  whence  he  hailed, 
and  Mr.  Patton,  who  was  named  for  the  position  of  attor 
ney-general,  was  a  leading  member  of  the  Richmond  bar, 
and  had  previously  been  prominent  in  political  affairs,  as  a 
member  of  Congress,  where  he  had  served  for  some  years. 
Mr.  Flournoy,  in  his  letter  of  acceptance,  after  defining  his 
views  on  public  questions,  wrote  in  regard  to  the  main 
issue  then  before  the  people  :  — 

"  I  indorse  fully  the  Basis  of  Principles  of  the  Ameri 
can  party,  believing  them  to  be  the  most  conservative  pre 
sented  to  the  consideration  of  the  country  since  the 
establishment  of  our  independence.  The  rapid  increase  of 
foreign  immigration  is  well  calculated  to  excite  alarm,  and 
the  power  of  the  government,  both  State  and  Federal, 
should  be  exerted  to  check  it.  It  seems  almost  impossible 
to  doubt  that  the  influx  of  between  four  and  five  hundred 
thousand  foreigners  into  our  country  annually  will  ulti 
mately  be  subversive  of  our  republican  institutions. 
Washington,  Jefferson,  Madison,  and  Jackson  gave  early 
warning  to  the  country  of  the  danger  to  be  apprehended 
from  foreign  influence.  The  naturalization  laws  should 
either  be  repealed  or  so  modified  and  such  restrictions 
imposed  as  to  avert  the  evil. 

"  The  South  is  especially  and  deeply  interested  in  this 
question.  This  immense  annual  addition  to  our  popula 
tion  settle  in  the  non-slaveholding  States  and  the  exten 
sive  territories  of  the  West  and  Northwest,  out  of  which 
free  States  will  come,  in  consequence,  to  be  more  speedily 
formed,  increasing  with  fearful  rapidity  the  balance  of 
power  against  us.  Intimately  connected  with  this  ques 
tion  of  foreign  immigration  is  the  growth  of  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church  in  our  country.  Despotic,  proscriptive, 
and  intolerant,  its  ascendency,  as  all  history  teaches,  has 
ever  been  destructive  of  freedom  of  opinion,  and  while  I 


THE  PRINCIPLES   OF   THE   AMERICAN   PARTY        183 

would  uncompromisingly  oppose  any  interference  with  the 
rights  of  its  members  as  citizens,  by  any  legislative  enact 
ment,  yet  by  a  full  and  independent  exercise  of  the  right 
of  suffrage  and  the  appointing  power,  they  should  be 
excluded  from  the  offices  of  the  government  in  all  its 
departments.  It  may  be  said  that  there  are  comparatively 
but  few  foreigners  and  Roman  Catholics  in  Virginia.  She 
is  not  acting  for  herself  alone.  She  is  a  leading  member 
of  this  great  sisterhood  of  States,  and  her  action  will  be 
felt  for  weal  or  woe,  by  them  all.  Her  destiny  is  identi 
fied  with  theirs,  and  she  cannot  look  with  indifference  to 
the  fact  that  the  great  valley  of  the  Mississippi,  watered 
by  twenty  thousand  miles  of  navigable  rivers,  and  the 
immense  and  fertile  territories,  stretching  beyond  to  the 
Pacific,  capable  of  sustaining  a  population  of  one  hundred 
millions,  are  rapidly  filling  up  with  this  class  of  people. 
I  will  advert  particularly  to  one  other  principle  of  the 
American  party,  the  4  non-intervention  of  the  Federal  and 
State  government  with  the  municipal  affairs  of  each 
other.'  The  strict  observance  of  this  principle  will  make 
the  union  of  the  States  perpetual." 

The  Winchester  convention  had  published  the  "Basis 
of  Principles  of  the  American  party  of  Virginia,"  above 
the  signature  of  a  committee  appointed  for  that  purpose ; 
but  as  the  principles  are  practically  the  same  as  those  con 
tained  in  the  letter  of  Mr.  Flournoy,  we  will  omit  them 
here.  The  reader  who  is  interested  in  the  history  of  the 
American  party  will  find  an  ably  written  defence  of  their 
position  in  the  series  of  articles  known  as  the  "  Madison 
Letters,"1  the  author  of  which  was  Alexander  H.  H. 
Stuart  of  Virginia.  The  champions  of  the  secret  order 
maintained  that  not  only  was  our  civilization  in  danger  of 
destruction  from  the  foreign  refuse,  who  annually  migrated 

1  See  Clusky's  Political  Cyclopedia. 


184  THE  LIFE   OF   HENKY   A.  WISE 

hither,  and  American  labor  forced  into  competition  with 
the  cheaper  imported  labor,  but  that  the  teachings  of  the 
Romish  Church  asserted  the  temporal  as  well  as  the 
spiritual  power  of  the  Pope,  and  that  the  articles  of  her 
faith  were  in  conflict  with  the  oath  of  a  naturalized  citizen 
to  support  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  and  the 
renunciation  of  all  allegiance  to  any  foreign  potentate. 

It  was  freely  urged,  as  it  has  been  in  recent  years,1  that 
the  sovereignty  of  the  Pope  was  opposed  to  that  of  the 
people,  and  that  his  commands,  with  the  devout  Romanist, 
demanded  a  higher  allegiance  than  our  Constitution  and 
laws,  and  that  the  settled  policy  of  that  Church  was  opposed 
to  a  free  press  and  our  system  of  free  schools.  Unfortu 
nately,  the  defiant  attitude  assumed  by  various  Catholic 
sympathizers  tended  to  confirm  another  charge,  often 
made,  that  Romanism  meant  religious  intolerance  and  was 
opposed  to  religious  liberty. 

The  editor  of  Brownson's  Quarterly  Review  had  bluntly 
declared :  "  Protestantism  of  every  form  has  not  and  never 
can  have  any  rights  where  Catholicism  is  triumphant." 
The  Rambler,  another  leading  Catholic  journal,  had 
said:  "You  ask  if  he  [the  Pope]  were  lord  in  the  land, 
and  you  were  in  a  minority,  if  not  in  numbers,  yet  in 
power,  what  would  we  do  to  you  ?  That  we  say  which 
would  benefit  the  cause  of  Catholicism ;  if  expedient,  he 
would  imprison  you,  banish  you,  fine  you,  possibly  hang 
you  —  but  be  assured  of  one  thing,  he  would  never  tolerate 
you  for  the  sake  of  the  '  glorious  principles  of  civil  and 
religious  liberty.' '  And  in  the  Shepherd  of  the  Valley, 
another  sectarian  paper,  was  to  be  found  the  following  in 
its  issue  of  November  23,  1851 :  "  If  Catholics  ever  gain 
an  immense  numerical  majority,  religious  freedom  in  this 

1  See  "Our  Country,"  by  Eev.  Josiah  Strong,  D.D.,  Chapter  V.  ;  also 
teachings  of  the  "American  Protective  Association." 


CATHOLICS    AS    CITIZENS  185 

country  is  at  an  end.  So  our  enemies  say.  So  we 
believe." 

Among  the  campaign  documents  circulated  throughout 
Virginia,  during  the  campaign  of  1855,  was  a  letter  of 
Bishop  McGill  of  Richmond,  in  reply  to  a  similar  one 
from  James  Lyons,  Esq.,  a  prominent  lawyer  of  Rich 
mond  and  a  brother-in-law  of  Wise,  the  character  of 
which  will  be  explained  by  the  response  of  the  bishop, 
which  was  as  follows :  — 

"  The  letter,  which  you  have  addressed  to  me,  contains 
three  questions,  to  which  you  ask  an  answer,  with  a  view 
to  publication.  First  Question :  '  Whether  the  Catholics 
in  Virginia  do  acknowledge  any  temporal  allegiance  to  the 
Pope  ? '  To  this  I  answer,  that  unless  there  be  in  Virginia 
some  Italians  who  owe  allegiance  to  the  Pope  as  a  temporal 
Prince,  because  they  were  born  in  his  States,  and  are  not 
naturalized  citizens  of  this  country,  there  are  no  Catholics 
in  Virginia  who  owe,  or  acknowledge,  any  temporal  alle 
giance  to  the  Pope. 

"  Second  Question :  4  Whether  if  this  country  could  be, 
and  was,  assailed  by  the  army  of  the  Pope  (if  he  had  one), 
or  by  any  other  Catholic  power,  the  Catholic  citizens  of 
this  country,  no  matter  where  born,  would  not  be  as  much 
bound  to  defend  the  Flag  of  America,  her  rights  and 
liberty,  as  any  native-born  citizen  would  be  ? ' 

"  Answer :  To  me  the  hypothesis  of  an  invasion  of  our 
country  by  the  Pope  seems  an  absurdity;  but  should  he 
come  with  armies  to  establish  temporal  dominion  here,  or 
should  any  other  Catholic  power  make  such  an  attempt, 
it  is  my  conviction  that  all  Catholic  citizens,  no  matter 
where  born,  who  enjoy  the  benefits  and  franchises  of  the 
Constitution,  would  be  conscientiously  bound,  like  native- 
born  citizens,  to  defend  the  flag,  rights,  and  liberties  of  the 
Republic,  and  repel  such  invasion. 


186  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

"  Third  Question :  '  Whether  the  performance  of  that 
duty  would  conflict  with  any  oath,  or  vow,  or  any  other 
obligation  of  the  Catholics  ? '  Answer :  Catholics,  reared 
in  the  Church  as  such,  have  not  the  custom  of  taking  any 
oaths  or  vows,  except  the  baptismal  vows,  4to  renounce 
the  devil,  his  works  and  pomps.'  Persons  converted  to 
the  faith,  or  those  receiving  degrees  in  Theology,  may  be 
required  to  take  the  oath  contained  in  the  creed  of  Pius 
IV.  of  obedience  to  the  Pope,  which,  as  far  as  I  know,  has 
always  been  understood  and  interpreted  to  signify  a  spirit 
ual  obedience  to  him  as  head  of  the  Church,  and  not  in 
obedience  to  him  as  a  temporal  prince.  Bishops,  on  their 
consecration,  also  take  an  oath,  which  in  our  country  is 
different  from  the  old  form  used  in  Europe.  But  none  of 
these  vows,  oaths,  and  no  other  obligation  of  which  I  am 
aware,  conflicts  with  the  duty  of  a  citizen  of  the  United 
States  to  defend  the  flag  and  liberties  of  his  country.  In 
conclusion,  allow  me  to  state  that  as  we  have  no  article 
of  faith  teaching  that  the  Pope,  of  divine  right,  enjoys 
temporal  power  as  head  of  the  Church,  whatever  some 
theologians  or  writers  may  have  said  on  this  point  must, 
like  my  answers  to  your  inquiries,  be  considered  as  opinions 
for  which  the  writers  themselves  only  can  be  held  respon 
sible." 

Mr.  Flournoy,  although  the  candidate  of  the  American 
party  for  governor,  took  no  part  in  the  campaign,  and  the 
canvass  of  the  Know-nothings  was  conducted  through  the 
medium  of  the  press,  the  Richmond  Whig  having  earnestly 
enlisted  in  their  behalf,  as  well  as  through  the  secret  coun 
cils  of  the  order,  which  were  organized  with  wonderful  effi 
ciency.  The  failure  of  Mr.  Flournoy  to  take  the  stump, 
although  in  accordance  with  the  policy  of  his  party,  was  a 
matter  of  regret  to  many  of  his  friends,  as  he  was  a  per 
suasive  and  effective  speaker,  and  would  have  gained  hun- 


THE   STATE   CANVASS  187 

dreds  of  votes  for  his  cause.  With  undiminished  zeal  Wise 
continued  his  tour  of  the  State,  throughout  the  months 
of  January,  February,  March,  and  April,  and  during  the 
early  part  of  May,  delivering  speeches  that  stirred  the 
hearts  of  the  Democracy  and  revived  their  drooping 
spirits.  The  canvass  of  a  State  like  Virginia  was  no  easy 
matter,  as  it  was  wretchedly  supplied  with  railways  and 
intersected  by  the  Alleghanies  and  Blue  Ridge,  and  travel 
to  the  county  court  houses  was  largely  by  private  convey 
ance,  over  roads  which  still  answered  the  description  of 
Tom  Moore's  lampoon:  — 

"  Ruts  and  ridges, 

And  bridges 
Made  of  planks, 

In  open  ranks, 
Like  old  women's  teeth !  " 

In  his  addresses  Wise  did  not  confine  himself  to  the 
issue  of  Know-nothingism  alone,  but  dwelt  at  length  upon 
his  favorite  topic  of  public  improvements  and  the  indus 
trial  development  of  the  State.  Oftentimes  his  hearers,  who 
came  expecting  to  hear  a  political  discussion  solely,  were 
entertained  for  hours  by  a  dissertation  upon  the  minerals, 
woods,  and  water-power  of  the  State,  the  encouragement 
of  manufactures,  and  the  need  of  improved  transportation 
facilities,  etc.  He  pledged  himself,  first  of  all,  to  main 
tain  the  credit  of  the  State  unimpaired,  and  declared,  "  If 
I  be  elected  governor  of  Virginia,  then,  I  tell  you  bluntly 
and  briefly,  if  it  be  necessary  to  tax  you  to  defend  her 
honor,  I  will  commend  taxation,  though  it  make  us 
groan.1  Next  to  public  credit,  next  to  the  honor  of 
the  State,  are  her  great  public  works.  Your  works 
have  been  begun  without  regard  to  their  relative  impor- 

1  Speech  at  Alexandria,  as  reported  in  New  York  Herald. 


188  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

tance.  You  have  not  completed  one  before  you  have 
begun  another  and  another.  Your  public  works  are  with 
out  termini.  Your  canals  and  your  railroads  are  like 
ditches  dug  in  the  middle  of  a  plantation,  without  outlet 
at  either  end.  You  appropriate  for  them  to-day,  neglect 
them  to-morrow,  and  leave  the  appropriations  of  the  day 
after  to-morrow  to  repair  decay.  It  is  time  that  some  one 
or  two,  or  as  many  as  you  can,  of  the  public  works  of  the 
State  of  Virginia  should  be  completed,  in  order  to  ease  the 
taxation  of  the  public.  It  is  time  they  should  be  completed 
in  order  to  render  some  profit  to  the  State.  All  that  the 
State  of  Virginia  has  been  wanting  has  been  to  reach  out  her 
arms  to  the  great  West  —  to  tap  the  Ohio  River  —  to  join 
the  Big  Bend  of  the  Ohio  River  with  your  rivers  in  the  East. 
You  have  reversed  in  times  past  the  order  of  true  policy. 
You  have  said :  4  Let  us  have  capital,  let  us  have  popula 
tion,  and  then  you  will  have  a  city.'  But  you  never  will 
have  capital,  you  never  will  have  population,  until  you 
have  the  internal  improvements  to  build  up  a  city.  You 
want  commerce.  You  have  bays,  quays,  roadsteads,  which 
would  float  the  navies  of  the  world ;  but  you  have  no  seat 
of  commerce  —  no  centre  of  trade  has  yet  pointed  its  spires 
to  the  heavens  on  the  soil  of  Virginia.  That  is  because 
you  have  completed  none  of  your  public  works.  What 
ever  difference  of  opinion,  then,  may  have  been  as  to  the 
commencement  of  your  works  of  State  improvement,  now 
that  they  are  begun,  now  that  millions  have  been  spent 
and  wasted  upon  them,  now  that  you  are  obliged  to  be 
taxed  in  order  to  complete  them,  the  sooner  you  submit 
to  the  taxation  to  complete  your  primary  works  the  better. 
"  And  the  most  expeditious  and  certainly  the  most  profita 
ble  way  of  completing  your  works  of  secondary  impor 
tance  is  to  complete  those  of  primary  importance.  If, 
then,  elected  governor  of  the  State  of  Virginia,  I  shall 


ONE   OF    THE   STUMP   SPEECHES  189 

use  all  the  influence  which  I  can  wield  consistently  with 
the  public  credit,  and  with  the  condition  of  the  people,  to 
expedite  the  completion  of  all  the  works  of  primary  im 
portance  in  the  State.  Next  to  your  public  works  and 
your  commerce,  your  agriculture  is  the  most  important. 
The  four  great  cardinal  sources  of  production  of  national 
wealth  are  commerce,  agriculture,  manufacturing,  and  min 
ing.  We  have  sixty-four  thousand  square  miles,  as  rich  in 
every  element  of  commerce,  in  every  element  of  agricul 
ture,  of  manufacturing,  and  mining  as  any  other  sixty-four 
thousand  square  miles  on  the  face  of  the  globe  ;  and  yet, 
with  all  four  powers  in  her  hand,  Virginia  has,  thus  far  in 
her  history,  relied  upon  one  source  alone.  On  Chesapeake 
Bay,  from  the  mouth  of  the  Rappahannock  to  the  capes 
of  the  Chesapeake,  you  have  roadsteads  and  harbors  suffi 
cient  to  float  the  navies  of  the  world.  From  the  River  of 
Swans,  on  whose  margin  we  are,  down  to  the  line  of  North 
Carolina,  you  have  the  Potomac,  the  Rappahannock,  the 
Piantatank,  from  Mobjack  Bay  to  James  River  and  the 
Elizabeth  River  —  all  meeting  in  the  most  beautiful  sheet 
of  water  of  all  the  seas  of  the  earth.  You  have  the  bowels 
of  your  western  mountains  rich  in  iron,  in  copper,  in  coal, 
in  salt,  in  gypsum,  and  the  very  earth  is  rich  in  oil,  which 
makes  the  very  rivers  inflame.  You  have  the  line  of  the 
Alleghany,  that  beautiful  blue  ridge  which  stands,  placed 
there  by  the  Almighty,  not  to  obstruct  the  way  of  the 
people  to  market,  but  placed  there  in  the  very  bounty  of 
Providence,  to  milk  the  clouds ;  to  make  the  sweet  springs 
which  are  the  sources  of  your  rivers.  And  at  the  head 
of  every  stream  is  the  waterfall  murmuring  the  very  music 
of  your  power.  And  yet  commerce  has  long  ago  spread 
her  sails  and  sailed  away  from  you  ;  you  have  not,  as  yet, 
dug  more  than  coal  enough  to  warm  yourselves  at  your 
own  hearths ;  you  have  set  no  tilt  hammer  of  Vulcan  to 


190  THE   LIFE   OP   HENRY   A.  WISE 

strike  blows  worthy  of  gods  in  the  iron  foundries.  You 
have  not  yet  spun  more  than  the  coarse  cotton  enough,  in 
the  way  of  manufacture,  to  clothe  your  own  slaves.  You 
have  had  no  commerce,  no  mining,  no  manufactures. 
You  have  relied  alone  on  the  single  power  of  agriculture : 
and  such  agriculture !  Your  sedge  patches  outshine  the 
sun.  Your  inattention  to  your  only  source  of  wealth  has 
scarred  the  very  bosom  of  mother  earth.  Instead  of  hav 
ing  to  feed  cattle  on  a  thousand  hills,  you  have  had  to 
chase  the  stump-tailed  steer  through  the  sedge  patches  to 
procure  a  tough  beefsteak.  And  yet,  while  your  trust  has 
been  in  the  hands  of  the  old  negroes  of  the  plantation, 
while  the  master  knows  as  little  as  his  slave  about  the 
science  —  applied  science  —  of  agriculture,  while  com 
merce  and  manufactures  and  mining  have  been  hardly 
known,  and  agriculture  has  been  neglected,  —  notwith 
standing  all  that,  and  notwithstanding  the  effect  of  this 
has  been  that  you  have  parted  with  as  much  population  as 
you  have  retained,  notwithstanding  all  this,  I  say,  old 
Virginia  still  has  a  million  and  a  half  of  population  left 
within  her  limits.  She  still  has  her  harbors  and  rivers 
and  her  water-power,  and  every  source  of  wealth  which 
thinking  men,  active  men,  enterprising  men,  need  apply  to." 
He  urged  the  need  of  a  complete  system  of  public  edu 
cation,  such  as  was  contemplated  by  Jefferson,  and  a  State 
school  of  scientific  agriculture.  Virginia,  he  described 
as  being  "  in  the  anomalous  condition  of  an  old  State  that 
has  all  the  capacities  of  a  new  one  —  of  a  new  State  that 
has  all  the  capacities  of  an  old  one."  On  the  subject  of 
slavery,  he  pointed  out  the  steady  growth  of  abolitionism 
throughout  the  North,  and  declared  that  the  Know-noth 
ings  were  abolitionists  in  disguise,  which  assertion  seemed 
in  a  measure  confirmed,  by  the  large  number  of  extremists 
throughout  the  North  and  New  England  who  were  promi- 


ONE  OF   THE  STUMP   SPEECHES  191 

nent  in  the  secret  order.  He  was  unsparing  in  his  denun 
ciation  of  this  class,  and  of  what  he  considered  the 
encroachments  upon  the  rights  of  the  South,  and  in  refer 
ring  to  an  extract  which  he  read  from  a  sermon  of  James 
Freeman  Clarke,  in  which  the  latter  had  observed  that 
''Northern  enthusiasm,  when  fully  aroused,  has  always 
been  more  than  a  match  for  Southern  organization," 
exclaimed :  "  Oh  !  gods !  Northern  conscience  !  Take  a 
shark  skin,  and  let  it  dry  to  shagreen  —  skin  the  rhinoce 
ros  —  go  then  and  set  the  silver  steel  and  grind  it,  and 
when  you  have  ground  it,  then  take  the  hone  and  whet  it 
till  it  would  split  a  hair,  and  with  it  prick  the  shagreen 
or  the  shark  skin,  and  then  go  and  try  it  on  Northern  con 
sciences  !  .  .  .  What  is  the  result  of  such  preaching, 
such  teaching,  such  printing?"  asked  Wise,  alluding  to 
the  tirades  of  the  abolitionists.  "What  has  been  the 
result  of  the  pulpit,  the  schoolhouses,  and  the  press  at  the 
North  upon  this  subject  ?  Gentlemen,  but  a  short  time 
back,  New  England — Massachusetts  especially  —  had 
but  one  ism  within  her  limits,  and  that  was  Puritanism, 
the  religion  of  the  Old  Covenanters  and  Congregation alists 
-  Puritanism,  full  of  vitality,  full  of  spirituality  —  Puri 
tanism  that  made  even  the  barren  rock  of  Plymouth  to 
fructify,  that  made  the  New  Englanders  a  strong  people, 
that  made  them  a  rich  people,  that  made  them  a  learned 
people.  But  since  they  have  waxed  fat,  since  they  have 
begun  to  build  churches  by  lottery,  begun  to  moralize  man 
kind  by  legislation,  begun  to  play  petty  providences  for 
the  people,  begun  to  be  Protestant  Popes  over  the  con 
sciences  of  men,  begun  to  preach  '  Christian  Politics,' 
such  as  you  have  heard,  Puritanism  has  disappeared,  and 
we  have  in  place  of  it  Unitarianism,  Universalism,  Fouri- 
erism,  Millerism,  Mormonism  —  all  the  odds  and  ends  of 
isms  —  until  at  last  you  have  a  grand  fusion  of  all  those 


192  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

odds  and  ends  of  isms  in  the  omnium  gatherum  of  isms, 
called  Know-nothingism.  .  .  .  Now  where  did  it  come 
from?  It  is  no  new  thing.  It  is  no  strange  thing. 
Although  it  is  a  wonder  here,  it  has  been  operating  for 
years  in  Old  England.  You  that  will  go  to  a  book-store 
and  buy  Dickens's  novel  of  '  Hard  Times '  will  see  a  por 
traiture  of  the  thing,  and  how  it  has  operated  in  a  country 
with  an  aristocracy  and  a  queen,  with  lords  proprietors  of 
factories  and  of  lands,  which  they  rent  to  middlemen  who 
grind  down  the  operatives.  There,  in  England,  the  secret 
association  of  the  operatives  against  grinding  capital,  I 
grant  you,  has  done  much  good.  There,  there  is  some 
necessity  for  it ;  there,  where  men's  noses  are  held  to  the 
grindstone  by  oppression ;  there,  where  all  the  luxuries  are 
free,  and  all  the  necessaries  of  life  are  taxed ;  there,  where 
the  operative  is  made  to  bear  all  the  burdens  of  society  ; 
there,  where  there  is  a  crowned  head  and  an  aristocracy  — 
there,  dark  lantern,  secret  association,  test  oaths,  have 
brought  forth  some  reforms.  Well,  seeing  its  effect  in 
that  country  —  Exeter  Hall  —  the  abolitionists  of  England 
send  it  over  to  the  preachers  of  '  Christian  Politics  '  in 
Boston  and  New  York,  to  apply  its  machinery  to  the 
North  and  the  non-slaveholding  States." 

In  discussing  the  anti-Romanist  attitude  of  the  Know- 
nothings,  Wise  said :  "  You  tell  the  people  that  Catholics 
never  gave  aid  to  civil  liberty ;  that  they  never  yet  struck 
a  blow  for  the  freedom  of  mankind.  Who  gave  you  alli 
ance  against  the  king  of  England?  Who  but  that  Catho 
lic  king,  Louis  XVI.  ?  He  sent  you  from  the  court  of 
Versailles,  the  boy  of  Washington's  camp,  a  foreigner  who 
never  was  naturalized,  but  bled  at  the  redoubt  of  York- 
town.  And  not  only  did  Lafayette  bleed  at  the  redoubt 
of  Yorktown,  when  Arnold,  a  native  proved,  like  Absalom, 
a  traitor,  but  when  the  German,  De  Kalb,  fell  at  the  field 


ONE  OP   THE  STUMP   SPEECHES  193 

of  Camden,  on  Southern  soil,  with  fourteen  bayonet  wounds 
transfixing  his  body,  and,  dying,  praised  the  Maryland 
militia,  Gates,  the  Yankee  native,  ran  seventy-five  miles 
without  looking  behind.  And  not  only  that:  In  that 
intense  moment  when  the  Declaration  of  our  Indepen 
dence  was  brought  into  Carpenter's  Hall  by  Rutledge  and 
Franklin  and  Jefferson,  and  laid  upon  the  table  —  that 
holy  paper,  which  not  only  pledged  life  and  honor,  but 
fortune,  too  —  realize  that  moment  of  intense,  of  deep, 
of  profound  interest,  when  the  Independence  of  this  land 
hung  upon  the  acts  of  men ;  when,  one  by  one,  men  arose 
from  their  seats  and  went  to  the  table  to  pledge  lives  and 
fortunes  and  sacred  honor, — at  length  one  spare,  pale-faced 
man  arose  and  went  and  dipped  the  pen  into  ink  and 
signed  4  Charles  Carroll,'  and  when  reminded  that  it  might 
not  be  known  what  Charles  Carroll  it  was,  that  it  be 
known  that  it  was  a  Charles  Carroll  who  was  pledging  a 
principality  of  fortune,  he  added  the  words  'of  Carroll- 
ton.'  He  was  a  Catholic  representative  from  a  Catholic 
colony.  And,  sir,  before  George  Washington  was  born, 
before  Lafayette  wielded  the  sword  or  Charles  Carroll  the 
pen  for  his  country,  six  hundred  and  forty  years  ago,  on 
the  16th  of  June,  1214,  there  was  another  scene  enacted 
on  the  face  of  the  globe,  when  the  general  character  of  all 
charters  of  freedom  was  gained  —  when  one  man  —  a  man 
called  Stephen  Langton  —  swore  the  barons  of  England, 
for  the  people,  against  the  orders  of  the  Pope  and  against 
the  power  of  the  king — swore  the  barons  on  the  high  altar 
of  the  Catholic  Church  at  St.  Edmondsbury,  that  they 
would  have  Magna  Charta  or  die  for  it,  —  the  charter 
which  secures  to  every  one  of  you  to-day  trial  by  jury, 
freedom  of  the  press,  freedom  of  the  pen,  the  confronting 
of  witnesses  with  the  accused,  and  the  opening  of  secret 
dungeons  — that  charter  was  obtained  by  Stephen  Langton 


194  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

against  the  Pope  and  against  the  king  of  England. ;  and  if 
you  Know-nothings  don't  know  who  Stephen  Langton  was, 
you  know  nothing  sure  enough.  He  was  a  Catholic  arch 
bishop  of  Canterbury.  I  come  here  not  to  praise  the 
Catholics,  but  I  come  here  to  acknowledge  historical  truth, 
and  to  ask  of  Protestants  what  has  heretofore  been  the 
pride  and  boast  of  Protestants,  —  tolerance  of  opinion  in 
religious  faith.  All  we  ask  is  tolerance.  All  we  ask  is, 
that  if  you  hate  the  Catholics  because  they  have  pro 
scribed  heretics,  you  won't  outproscribe  proscription.  If 
you  hate  the  Catholics  because  they  have  nunneries  and 
monasteries  and  Jesuitical  secret  orders,  don't  outjesuit 
the  Jesuits  by  going  into  dark-lantern  secret  chambers  to 
apply  test  oaths.  If  you  hate  the  Catholics  because  you 
say  they  encourage  the  Machiavellian  expediency  of  telling 
lies  sometimes,  don't  swear  yourselves  not  to  tell  the  truth. 
Here  are  the  oaths  —  the  oaths  that  bind  you  under  no 
circumstances  to  disclose  who  you  are  or  what  you  are, 
and  that  bind  you  not  only  to  political,  but  to  social  pro 
scription.  Here  is  your  book  [holding  up  a  copy  of  the 
American  ritual]  — your  Bible  which  requires  of  you  to  stick 
up  your  notices  between  midnight  and  daybreak.  I  don't 
object  to  secrecy.  I  am  a  member  of  a  secret  order,  and  I 
am  proud  to  be  a  brother  Mason ;  and  I  am  at  liberty  by 
my  order  to  say  that  as  to  its  ends,  its  purposes,  its  designs, 
Masonry  has  no  secrets.  Its  ends,  its  purposes,  its  aims, 
are  to  make  a  brotherhood  of  charity  amongst  men.  Its 
end  is  the  end  of  the  Christian  law  of  religion.  I  know 
not  how  any  Mason  can  be  a  Know-nothing.  Masonry 
binds  its  members  to  respect  and  obey  the  laws  of  the 
land  in  which  we  live ;  and  when  the  Constitution  of 
the  United  States  declares  that  no  religious  test  shall  be 
made  a  qualification  for  office,  Masonry  dare  not  interpose 
by  conspiring,  in  a  secret  association,  to  attempt  to  make 


ONE    OF   THE    STUMP    SPEECHES  195 

a  religious  test  a  qualification  for  office.  When  Virginia 
has  an  act  of  religious  freedom  —  an  act  that  is  no  longer 
a  mere  statute  law,  but  is  now  a  part  of  the  organic  law, 
and  which  says  that  no  man  shall  be  burdened  for  religious 
opinion's  sake  —  Masonry  dare  not  conspire  to  burden  any 
man  for  opinion's  sake.  Masonry  has  no  secrets  but  the 
simple  tests  by  which  it  recognizes  its  brotherhood.  It  is 
bound  to  respect  the  law  and  to  tolerate  differences  of 
opinion  in  religion  and  politics.  I  do  not  complain  of 
secrecy,  but  I  complain  of  secrecy  for  political  objects. 
What  is  your  object  ?  It  is  to  assail  the  Constitution  of 
the  United  States,  to  conspire,  to  contradict  the  Constitu 
tion  and  laws  of  the  land;  it  is  to  conspire  against  the 
Constitution  and  laws,  and  swear  men  by  test  oaths  —  the 
most  odious  instruments  of  tyranny  that  intolerance  and 
proscription  have  ever  devised.  It  is  not  only  to  proscribe 
Catholics  and  foreigners,  but  it  is  to  proscribe  Protestants 
and  natives,  too,  who  will  not  unite  with  you  in  proscrib 
ing  Catholics  and  foreigners.  It  is  further  than  that :  It 
destroys  all  individuality  in  the  man.  You  bring  in  your 
novitiate,  you  swear  him  to  do  —  what  ?  To  give  up  his 
conscience,  his  judgment,  his  will,  to  the  judgment  and 
the  conscience  and  the  will  of  an  association  of  men  who 
are  not  willing  that  others  should  enslave  them,  but  by 
their  test  oath  enslave  themselves." 

In  alluding  to  the  triumph  of  the  abolitionists  through 
out  the  Northern  States,  and  their  threatened  invasion  of 
Virginia,  Wise  said :  — 

"  No  man  loves  and  adores  the  Union  of  this  land  more 
than  I  do.  I  have  been  taught  to  venerate  and  to  cherish 
the  Union  of  these  States.  It  is  the  holiest  of  all  holy 
things.  I  would  gladly  give  my  life,  my  blood,  as  a  sacri 
fice  to  save  it  if  required.  But  I  know  that  the  main 
pillars  of  the  Union,  the  main  props  and  supporters  of 


196  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

this  palladium,  are  the  pillars  of  State  rights  and  State 
sovereignty.  If  you  place  me  with  your  sword  in  hand  by 
that  great  pillar  of  Virginia  sovereignty,  I  promise  you  to 
bear  and  forbear  to  the  last  extremity.  I  will  suffer  much, 
suffer  long,  suffer  almost  anything  but  dishonor.  But  it 
is,  in  my  estimation,  with  the  union  of  these  States  as  it  is 
with  the  union  of  matrimony.  You  may  suffer  almost 
anything  except  dishonor ;  but  when  honor  is  touched  the 
union  must  be  dissolved.  I  will  not  say  that.  I  take  back 
the  words.  I  will  not  allow  myself  to  contemplate  a  dis 
solution  of  the  Union.  No,  we  will  try  to  save  it.  But 
when  the  worst  comes  to  the  worst,  if  compelled  to  draw 
the  sword  of  Virginia,  I  will  draw  it ;  and  by  the  gods  of 
the  State  and  her  holy  altars,  if  I  am  compelled  to  draw  it, 
I  will  flesh  it,  or  it  shall  pierce  my  body.  And  I  tell  you 
more :  we  have  got  abolitionists  in  this  State.  If  I  should 
have  to  move,  some  of  the  first,  I  fear,  against  whom  I 
should  have  to  act  would  be  some  within  our  own  limits. 
But  if  forced  to  fight,  I  will  not  confine  myself  to  the 
State  of  Virginia.  My  motto  will  be :  — 

"  *  Woe  to  the  coward  that  ever  he  was  born 

That  did  not  draw  the  sword  before  he  blew  the  horn.'  " 

In  conclusion,  Wise  declared,  in  referring  to  his  canvass 
against  the  Know-nothings :  "  Tell  them  distinctly  there 
shall  be  no  compromise,  no  parley.  I  will  come  to  no 
terms.  They  shall  either  crush  me  or  I  will  crush  them 
in  this  State." 

On  the  7th  of  May,  after  having  been  "  on  the  stump  " 
since  early  in  January,  during  which  time  he  had  travelled 
over  three  thousand  miles,  Wise  concluded  his  tour  of 
the  State  at  Leesburg,  the  county-seat  of  Loudoun. 
His  labors  had  told  heavily  upon  him  despite  his  steel- 
spring  energy,  and  he  was  much  worn  and  exhausted  from 


A   CAMPAIGN   STORY  197 

the  effects  of  excessive  speaking.  An  amusing  story,  rela 
tive  to  his  appearance  at  this  period,  was  formerly  current 
in  Virginia,  and  appeared  in  print  a  few  years  ago,  in 
Harper's  Magazine,1  from  which  we  reproduce  it  here. 

During  the  course  of  his  campaign,  he  visited  the  town 
of  Liberty,  in  Bedford  County,  for  the  purpose  of  address 
ing  the  people  of  that  neighborhood  on  the  political  situa 
tion.  He  was  received  with  great  e*clat  by  the  citizens  of 
the  town  and  was,  of  course,  introduced  to  all  the  local 
notables,  without  regard  to  party.  Among  these  was  a 
Mr.  Foggy  who  resided  at  the  foot  of  the  Peaks  of  Otter, 
a  gentleman  who  was  not  awed  the  least  when  in  the 
presence  of  greatness.  The  following  colloquy  ensued 
between  them :  - 

MR.  F.   "Mr.  Wise, I  am  glad  to  see  you." 

MR.  W.  "  Mr.  Foggy,  I  am  happy  to  make  your  ac 
quaintance." 

MR.  F.  "  But  I  am  sorry  to  say  that  I  can't  vote  for 
you  for  governor." 

MR.  W.  "  I  am  sorry  for  that,  Mr.  Foggy ;  but  as  this 
is  a  free  country,  every  man  has  a  right  to  vote  as  he 
pleases." 

MR.  F.  "I  tell  you  how  I  feel  about  it,  Mr.  Wise. 
When  I  was  a  young  man,  I  was  what  is  called  a  thimble- 
rigger,  and  I  went  to  all  the  hoss  races  in  the  neighbor 
hood  with  my  thimbles  and  ball,  crying  out,  ''Tis  here, 
and  'tain't  there,  'tain't  there  and  'tis  there,'  a-foolin'  many 
a  gawkin'  chap  outen  his  money.  Wa'al,  for  years  at  all 
these  races,  a  little  hoss  named  Waxy  had  been  winnin' 
all  the  stakes  every  time.  An'  he  allers  come  out  ahead. 
Wa'al,  when  I  war  a-workin'  one  day  as  usual  with  my 
thimbles,  I  noticed  the  ugliest,  scrawniest,  long-legged, 
sharp-hipped  lookin'  critter  led  on  the  track  I  ever  saw ; 

1  See  Harpers  Magazine,  Vol.  LXX.,  December,  1884. 


198  THE    LIFE   OF    HENRY    A.  WISE 

an'  he  war  called  Wee  Hawk.  I  soon  found  he  war 
entered  agin  Waxy,  and  as  they  thought  it  war  for  a 
joke,  big  odds  were  offered  agin  him.  I  looked  him  all 
over,  an'  though  he  war  a  hard-lookin'  cuss  of  the  hoss 
kind,  I  noticed  thar  war  fire  in  his  eye,  and  he  war  winkin' 
like  he'd  been  thar  before.  I  looked  at  my  pile,  and 
thinks  I  to  myself,  4Now  if  I  bet  on  Waxy  an'  win,  it 
won't  amount  to  much ;  but  if  I  bet  on  Wee  Hawk  an' 
win,  I'll  have  a  pile  worth  talkin'  of.  I  looked  agin  at 
old  Wee  Hawk,  an'  seein'  the  fire  in  his  eye  a-flashin' 
more  and  more,  I  concluded  I'd  risk  it.  Wa'al,  when  old 
Wee  Hawk  war  brought  out  alongside  Waxy,  you  oughter 
heard  the  guyin'  the  crowd  give  his  rider.  '  Take  'im  off.' 
4  Look  out  for  the  crows.'  '  Fasten  some  hay  on  a  stick 
ahead  of  his  nose,'  and  the  like,  war  heard  on  every  side. 
All  this  time  Waxy  war  prancin'  around,  everybody  feelin' 
sure  he'd  win.  Wa'al,  as  I  war  a-sayin',  when  they  war  led 
out  to  start,  Wee  Hawk  began  to  ruffle  his  feathers,  and 
as  the  sayin'  is,  c  snuffed  the  battle  from  afar,'  and  it  took 
three  men  to  hold  him.  An'  when  the  judge  said,  '  Go ! ' 
you  oughter  seen  old  Wee  Hawk  a-straightenin'  out  his 
long  legs  an'  neck,  an'  lightenin'  out  as  if  he  war  another 
Diomed  or  Sir  Archy,  which  war  great  racin'  bosses  in  old 
times.  Waxy  war  nowhar,  an'  come  out  more  than  six 
lengths  behind  Wee  Hawk.  The  fellows  who  had  been 
yellin'  to  give  him  to  the  crows  war  not  crowin'  so  much 
when  they  found  they  had  to  hand  over  to  me,  an'  it  war 
the  worst-beat  crowd  you  ever  saw.  Wa'al,  now,  Mr.  Wise, 
I  never  did  see  a  man  look  so  much  like  a  hoss  as  you  do 
like  Wee  Hawk ;  an'  though  I  can't  vote  for  you,  I'll  bet 
my  pile  on  you." 

Mr.  Wise,  observes  the  narrator,  laughed  heartily  at  the 
comparison,  and  the  result  soon  proved  that  the  "  fire  war 
thar." 


THE   END    OF   THE   CANVASS  199 

From  Leesburg  Wise  repaired  to  Washington  City  to 
await  the  battle  at  the  polls  on  the  24th  of  May.  While 
resting  there  from  his  labors,  he  addressed  the  following 
letter l  to  the  people  of  Virginia,  dated  May  10,  1855. 

"  FELLOW  -CITIZENS  :  —  I  have  now  finished  the  can 
vass  of  the  State.  On  the  7th  inst.,  at  Leesburg,  I  met 
my  last  appointment.  Incessant  and  excessive  labors  for 
127  days  have  so  impaired  my  health  and  strength  that 
I  must  desist  from  further  effort  and  seek  rest.  I  retire 
from  the  4  stump '  the  less  reluctantly  because  I  may  now 
justly  claim  that  I  have  faithfully  tried  to  do  my  part, 
and  I  can  confidently  leave  the  rest  to  the  unsubdued  and 
unterrified  Democracy  and  its  loyal  hosts.  Never  were  the 
sound  conservative,  conscientious,  and  stake-holding  Re 
publicans  in  Virginia  better  organized  and  more  aroused 
than  they  are  at  the  present  time.  They  have  been  deserted 
by  a  few  who  left  their  party  for  its  good ;  but,  in  turn, 
the  very  flower  of  the  old  opposition  of  Whiggery,  re 
spectable  in  times  past  for  its  profession  of  conservatism 
and  its  love  of  law  and  order,  have  chosen  the  elect 
Democracy,  with  all  the  ills  they  complain  of  it,  rather 
than  to  fly  to  those  they  ''Know  not  off 

"  The  personnel  of  the  party  was  never  more  purified, 
and  the  numerical  majority  was  never  larger  than  it 
promises  to  be  at  the  coming  election.  As  in  1801  the 
Democracy  stood  'like  a  wall'  and  rolled  back  the  tide 
of  federalism,  so  now  it  stands  and  will  roll  back  the 
tide  of  fanaticism !  It  will  prove  itself  to  be  the  visible 
invincible !  It  is  roused  and  will  rally  to  the  polls  ten 
thousand  voters  more  than  ever  gave  the  viva  voce  before ! 
And  the  viva  voce  will  rend  the  veil  from  the  4  invisible ' 
and  defend  the  freedom  and  independence  of  the  elective 

1  See  Hambleton,  pages  353,  354. 


200  THE   LIFE    OF   HENRY    A.   WISE 

franchise  and  the  Constitution  and  the  laws  against  the 
conspiracy  of  the  dark  lantern. 

"  It  will  forbid  any  power  in  Virginia  to  interpose 
between  our  conscience  and  our  God. 

"It  will  save  the  Protestant  churches  from  the  pollu 
tion  of  party  politics,  and  conserve  their  powers  of  truth 
for  the  pulling  down  of  strongholds,  free  from  the  taint 
and  violence  of  persecution.  It  will  trust  in  God,  and 
defend  the  Christian  faith  from  intolerance,  and  allow 
poor  humanity  to  indulge  in  the  virtues  of  charity  and 
peace  on  earth  and  good-will  to  all  men. 

"It  will  not  only  oppose  any  'legislative  enactment' 
to  interfere  with  the  rights  of  the  members  of  any  church 
as  citizens,  but  it  will  deny  the  power  of  the  legislature 
to  annul  the  new  Constitution,  which  has  made  the  act 
of  religious  freedom  irrepealable.  That  act  is  now  or 
ganic  law.  And  the  Democratic  conservatism  will  allow 
no  party  nor  power  to  set  up  a  higher  law  and  say  that 
a  man  shall  be  burthened,  when  the  Constitution  says 
he  shall  not  be  burthened,  for  reason  of  his  religious  opin 
ion,  by  being  excluded  from  eligibility  to  office,  or  by  re 
moval  from  office  because  of  his  religion  or  the  place  of 
his  birth. 

"It  will  prevent  the  repudiation  of  the  right  of  natu 
ralization,  for  which  the  nation  poured  out  its  blood  and 
treasure  for  three  years  in  the  second  war  of  Independence 
with  Great  Britain. 

"  It  will  defend  the  State  right  to  regulate  citizenship. 
It  will  not  deny  to  the  oppressed  a  home,  nor  prevent 
the  population  '  of  these  States '  still  requiring  hundreds 
of  millions  of  immigrants,  who  bring  with  them  hundreds 
of  millions  of  money. 

"It  will  allow  the  poor,  as  well  as  the  rich,  to  come 
and  '  drink  of  the  waters '  of  liberty  freely.  And  it  will 


A  LETTER   TO   THE  PEOPLE   OF   VIRGINIA  201 

remember  that  all  are  not  criminals  whom  European  des 
pots  call  such  and  send  away  from  troubling  their  domin 
ions.  It  will  take  by  the  hand  other  criminals  besides 
John  Mitchell,  and  feel  for  others  in  the  prison-houses 
and  dungeons  of  the  Old  World  besides  him  who  once 
was  tenant  of  Olmutz ! 

"  It  will  jealously  guard  against  the  European  influence 
which  is  insidiously  sent  from  Exeter  Hall  in  Old  England 
to  Williams  Hall  in  New  England  to  invade  America  in 
the  name  of  an  '  American '  party ;  and  it  will  watch  the 
oppressor,  not  the  oppressed,  abroad,  as  did  Washington, 
Jefferson,  Madison,  and  Jackson ! 

"It  will  defend  the  freedom  and  independence  of  the 
elective  franchise  against  the  conspiracy  which  would 
bind  voters  by  test  oaths  to  reject  men  of  a  particular 
religious  faith,  marked  for  proscription,  and  which  would 
not  leave  suffrage  as  free  to  elect  as  to  reject  those  whom 
the  Constitution  and  the  laws  have  made  eligible  to  office. 

"It  will  especially  guard  the  office  of  governor  from 
the  avowed  intent  to  wield  the  appointing  power  so  as 
not  to  obey  the  limitations  of  qualifications  for  office  fixed 
by  the  Constitution,  but  to  obey  rules  of  appointment  es 
tablished  by  an  irresponsible  and  authorized  Secret  Oli 
garchy,  formed  to  set  up  the  Higher  Law  of  its  own 
prescription  for  its  own  exclusive  and  selfish  ends. 

"  It  will  see  that  the  oath  itself  of  the  governor's  office 
is  not  perverted  by  sectarian  bigotry  to  set  up  a  religious 
test  as  a  qualification  for  office.  It  will  defend  the  Gen 
eral  Government  from  the  consolidation  which  would 
establish  itself  on  what  is  called  the  independence  of 
Congress. 

"It  will  defend  public  policy  from  the  faith  of  the 
American  system,  Harbors,  Rivers,  and  Pacific  Railroads 
and  Protective  Tariffs  and  Internal  Improvements  by  the 


202  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY    A.    WISE 

General  Government,  now  again  advanced  by  a  Win 
chester  Council  of  the  American  party.  It  will  defend 
the  State  against  agrarianism,  free-soilism,  and  abolition 
ism  now  threatening  to  invade  the  South  from  Northern 
non-slaveholding  Councils  of  Know-nothingism.  It  will 
defend  society  against  the  demoralization  of  a  cabal  sworn 
to  practise  dissimulation  and  perfidy  between  man  and 
man.  And  it  will  defend  religion  against  the  demons 
of  Antichrist!  With  perfect  and  abiding  confidence  in 
the  power  of  Truth  and  Democracy,  of  a  purified,  exalted, 
and  triumphant  majority  for  these  impregnable  positions, 
I  go  home  to  Accomack  and  await  the  polls  of  the  people. 
I  cannot  do  so  without  thanking  thousands  of  the  sections 
of  the  State  through  which  I  have  passed  for  their  uniform 
hospitality,  kindness,  and  respect,  and  without  saying  that 
the  chief  gratification  with  which  I  part  from  a  daily  inter 
course  with  the  masses  of  the  people  is  that  I  have  endeav 
ored  to  sow  the  seeds  of  truth  only  in  the  popular  mind, 
and  I  trust  that  they  will  be  fruitful  of  blessings  to 
individuals,  to  the  State,  and  to  the  country." 

On  the  24th  day  of  May,  1855,  what  had  been  one  of  the 
most  exciting  campaigns  that  has  ever  occurred  in  this 
country  came  to  an  end,  and  the  viva  voce  of  the  people  of 
Virginia  was  given  for  the  Democratic  standard-bearer. 
The  total  vote  of  the  State  was  156,668,  of  which  Wise  re 
ceived  83,424  votes,  and  Flournoy  73,244,  being  a  majority 
of  10,180  for  the  former.  Throughout  the  Northern 
States  the  result  in  Virginia  had  been  watched  with  in 
tense  interest,  the  Know-nothings  having  carried  the  gov 
ernors  and  legislatures  of  New  Hampshire,  Massachusetts, 
Rhode  Island,  Connecticut,  New  York,  California,  and 
Kentucky;  and  all  eyes  were  turned  toward  the  Old 
Dominion  as  the  natural  gateway,  or  "entering  wedge,"  to 
the  Southern  States.  The  result  of  the  Virginia  election 


DEFEAT   OF   THE   KNOW-NOTHINGS  203 

spread  like  wild-fire,  and  Wise  was  called  upon  in  the  city 
of  Washington  at  Brown's  Hotel,  by  an  immense  throng 
of  his  admirers,  before  whom  he  appeared,  and  amid  the 
frequent  interruptions  of  the  Know-nothings  present,  de 
clared  in  eloquent  tones,  "  I  have  met  the  Black  Knight 
with  his  visor  down,  and  his  shield  and  lance  are  broken." 
In  referring  to  the  triumph  of  "  Sam  "  in  the  Northern 
States,  he  said,  "  He  might  live  in  the  land  of  secret  ballot, 
but  he  could  not  survive  the  viva  voce  of  the  people." 

The  triumphant  march  of  the  secret  order  in  America 
was  thenceforward  broken,  and  the  "  dark  lantern  "  had 
lost  its  attractiveness,  for  in  addition  to  Virginia,  Georgia, 
Alabama,  Louisiana,  and  Mississippi  gave  their  verdict 
against  the  new  movement,  and  Know-nothingism,  instead 
of  successfully  invading  the  South,  received  an  over 
whelming  defeat.  But  one  circumstance  detracted  from 
Wise's  gratification  at  the  result  in  Virginia;  namely,  his 
native  county  Accomack  had  gone  against  him,  but  he  had 
turned  the  tables  upon  his  opponent,  Flournoy,  by  carry 
ing  Halifax,  the  latter's  county.  The  result  in  Accomack 
was  explained,  not  only  by  the  free-soil  sentiment  that 
exists  there  but  by  the  close  intercourse  commercially  and 
otherwise  with  Baltimore,  where  the  Know-nothings  held 
full  sway,  and  the  further  fact  that  Wise  had  not  been 
able  to  visit  the  eastern  shore  during  the  canvass  and  to 
contradict  certain  adverse  rumors  which  the  northern 
Methodists  had  circulated  against  him.  Upon  his  arrival 
in  his  native  county  he  was  greeted  by  immense  crowds, 
who  gathered  about  him  to  congratulate  him  on  the  result, 
and  he  said  in  a  public  address  to  his  fellow-citizens  in 
alluding  to  the  vote  in  Accomack,  "  The  mother  may  for 
get  the  son,  but  the  son  will  not  forget  the  mother." 

On  June  29  Wise  wrote  in  a  letter  to  his  friend,  Sena 
tor  George  W.  Jones  of  Iowa :  "  My  policy  from  first  to 


204  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.    WISE 

last  was  to  strike  so  fast  and  thick  at  4  Sam,'  that  he  was 
kept  on  the  defensive  all  the  time.  The  man  who  defends 
in  politics  is  half  whipped.  I  have  often  been  taken  for 
an  impulsive  man  to  my  advantage.  The  enemy  was  sur 
prised  that  I  never  stopped  to  defend  a  position,  but  kept 
pressing  constantly  upon  his  centre  until  it  was  broken. 
It  was  a  desperate  battle,  Jones.  As  late  as  February  we 
were  beaten  twenty  thousand  votes.  Nothing  but  Napo 
leonic  tactics  could  save  the  field.  I  won't  march  to  Mos 
cow  after  them.  But  the  North  must  not  cross  the 
Virginia  line  with  its  worse  than  icy  cold  4  isms.' " 

In  summing  up  the  causes  which  led  to  the  overthrow 
of  Know-nothingism  in  Virginia,  it  would  be  unjust  not  to 
acknowledge  the  valuable  services  of  the  press,  prominent 
among  which  were  the  Richmond  Enquirer,  edited  by 
Roger  A.  Pryor,  and  the  Examiner,  edited  by  Robert 
W.  Hughes,  while  yeomen  service  was  rendered  by  such 
able  speakers  as  Shelton  F.  Leake,  John  B.  Floyd, 
Patrick  Henry  Aylett,  James  Lyons,  Richard  K.  Meade, 
Elisha  W.  McComas,  William  H.  Harman,  Henry  L.  Hop 
kins,  and  others.  Nor  were  the  old-line  Whigs  altogether 
lacking  in  their  support  of  the  Democracy,  for  there  were 
many  who  refused  to  ally  themselves  with  the  new  secret 
order.  However,  it  is  no  disparagement  of  any  of  these, 
whether  Democrats  or  Whigs,  to  assert  that  Wise  had 
been  from  first  to  last  the  central  figure  for  the  canvass, 
and  his  eloquent  voice  had  served  more  than  all  others 
combined  to  animate  and  inspire  the  Democratic  hosts  and 
break  the  ranks  of  the  enemy. 

Although  the  American  party  had  the  boldness  to  put 
forward  Millard  Fillmore  for  the  presidency  in  1856,  yet 
the  force  of  the  movement  had  been  spent,  and  from  the 
beginning  it  had  served  no  other  end  than  to  delay,  for  a 
short  while,  the  inevitable  conflict  between  the  sections, 


DECLINE   OF   THE   AMERICAN   PARTY  205 

which,  however,  it  was  powerless  to  prevent.  In  the  hour 
of  its  first  successes,  Horace  Greeley  had  remarked  that  it 
had  "  about  as  many  of  the  elements  of  persistences  as  an 
anti-cholera  or  anti-potato  rot  party  would  have."  The 
attempted  evasion  of  the  slavery  question,  at  a  time  when 
the  issue  had  to  be  met,  and  its  lack  of  clearly  defined 
policies  as  to  public  affairs,  justified  this  observation,  apart 
from  the  anachronism  presented  by  a  secret  oath-bound 
order  in  a  free  republic.  As  Professor  Alexander  John 
ston  has  written  of  the  political  conditions  in  1856,  "  the 
first  wave  of  the  Republican  tide  from  the  West  had 
washed  nativism  almost  out  of  New  England,"  as  in  fact  it 
was  rapidly  doing  throughout  the  North,  and  the  Ameri 
can  organization  thenceforward  played  but  an  insignificant 
part  upon  the  public  stage  which  had  been  cleared  for  the 
great  tragedy  soon  to  be  enacted. 


CHAPTER   XIII 

URGED  TO  BECOME  A  PRESIDENTIAL  CANDIDATE.  INAUGURA 
TION  AS  GOVERNOR.  ADVOCATES  BUCHANAN  FOR  PRESIDENT. 
CONFERENCE  AT  RALEIGH.  THE  CEREDO  COLONY  IN  VIRGINIA. 
VIEWS  AS  TO  THANKSGIVING  DAY.  IMPROVEMENT  AND 
MATERIAL  DEVELOPMENT  OF  VIRGINIA,  AND  CAUSES  THAT 
HAD  RETARDED  IT  STATED.  VIEWS  ON  SUBJECT  OF  AN 
OYSTER  TAX,  AND  STATE  INSURANCE.  STATE  ARMS,  FI 
NANCES,  ETC. 

THE  peaceful  retirement,  afforded  by  his  home  in 
Accomack,  furnished  Wise  the  much-needed  rest  after  the 
arduous  duties  which  he  had  performed  on  the  hustings. 
The  Virginia  election  had  not  only  been  anxiously  watched, 
on  account  of  its  effect  on  the  success  of  the  American 
party  in  the  Southern  States,  but  the  triumph  of  Wise 
had  forthwith  caused  his  name  to  be  widely  discussed  in 
connection  with  the  Democratic  nomination  for  the  presi 
dency  to  be  made  in  1856.  Mr.  Buchanan,  who,  at  the 
time,  was  residing  abroad,  as  the  American  minister  at 
the  Court  of  St.  James,  had  expressed  to  personal  friends 
his  great  gratification  at  the  election  of  Wise,  and  the 
pleasure  it  would  afford  him  to  see  the  former  chosen  as 
the  Democratic  standard-bearer  in  the  approaching  presi 
dential  contest.  Wise  does  not  appear  at  first  to  have 
entertained  any  very  serious  views  in  regard  to  the  election 
of  himself  or  any  other  Southern  man  to  the  presidency, 
and  in  July,  1855,  he  wrote  from  "  Only,"  in  Accomack, 

206 


PRESIDENTIAL    NOMINATION    CONSIDERED  207 

to  his  friend,  Senator  George  W.  Jones  of  Iowa :  "  The 
thought  of  running  for  the  presidency  has  never  troubled 
my  dreams,  sleeping  or  waking.  No,  that  is  beyond  the 
permission  of  the  politicians.  They  will  manage  that 
matter  all  their  own  way,  and  I  will  be  content  to  see 
that  they  are  compelled  to  look  to  the  good  of  our  common 
country."  And  in  September  of  the  same  year,  in  a  letter 
to  Robert  Tyler,  who  then  resided  in  Philadelphia,  and 
who  was  anxious  to  bring  forward  his  name,  he  wrote : 1  "  I 
have  no  idea  that  any  slaveholding  Democrat  can  get  the 
next,  or  any,  nomination  hereafter  for  the  presidency. 
Free-soilism  will  run  rampant  over  all  considerations  of 
Constitution,  or  Union,  or  country.  My  only  fear  is  that 
it  will  tempt  and  frighten  the  time-serving  aspirants  of 
the  South  to  distract  and  divide,  and  it  may  be  to  para 
lyze  us.  For  myself,  I  have  no  compromise  to  make  with 
it,  and  would,  by  the  Eternal,  shoot  any  Southern  traitor 
who  would  bargain  away  our  property,  and  our  honor 
especially,  to  its  demands.  And  thus  resolved,  I  mean 
to  continue  to  act  as  if  I  was  not  thought  of  for  any 
place  of  political  preferment.  There  shall  be  no  scramble 
in  Virginia  or  the  South,  if  I  can  help  it,  for  the  nomina 
tion  of  the  presidency.  I  will  not  consent  that  my  name 
shall  be  used  to  divide  our  people,  and  my  friends  shall 
act  with  Hunter's,  or  it  shall  not  be  my  fault.  I  shall 
urge  the  preparation  of  the  State  for  events  which  are 
casting  their  substance,  more  than  their  shadows,  before 
them ;  and  if  the  worst  comes  to  the  worst,  I  will  not  wait 
on  Virginia  soil  to  fight  the  battle,  —  the  African  war 
shall  go  into  Africa."  Although  at  first  not  inclined  to 
consider  his  own  nomination  within  the  range  of  proba 
bility,  he  readily  succumbed  to  the  notion,  after  the 

1  "Letters  and  Times  of  the  Tylers,"  by  Lyon  G.  Tyler,  Vol.   II., 
page  521. 


208  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

manner  of  American  politicians  generally,  and  was  flat 
tered  by  the  letters  that  poured  in  upon  him,  as  well  as 
by  the  notices  in  the  public  press. 

On  the  1st  of  January,  1856,  he  took  the  oath  of  office 
as  governor,  without  any  inaugural  ceremony,  and  entered 
upon  the  discharge  of  his  duties.  A  few  days  later  he 
wrote  to  his  friend,  George  Booker  of  Hampton :  "  I  find 
my  office  no  sinecure.  We  got  in  the  Government  house 
on  the  8th  inst.,  and  on  the  1st  the  whole  city  rushed  my 
liquor  so  free  that  the  footing  of  the  bill  frightens  me." 
At  this  time  he  still  had  hopes  of  his  own  nomination,  but 
later  on  became  convinced  of  the  impracticability  of  putting 
forward  any  Southern  candidate. 

The  national  convention  of  the  Democratic  party  assem 
bled  at  Cincinnati  in  June  of  that  year.  Whether  the 
nomination  of  Buchanan  was  due  to  Wise's  influence,  as 
stated  by  Von  Hoist,  or  not,  he  had  undoubtedly  much  to  do 
with  the  bringing  about  of  that  result.  Wise  had  espoused 
the  cause  of  Buchanan  on  account  of  the  vote  of  Penn 
sylvania,  and  in  a  speech  delivered  at  a  ratification  meet 
ing  in  Richmond  declared,  "  She  [Pennsylvania]  alone 
of  all  the  middle  and  northeastern  States  stood  firm  for 
Democracy,  she  alone  of  the  Northern  and  non-slavehold- 
ing  States  of  largest  Federal  strength  and  size  remains  true 
and  reliable."  The  fact  that  the  electoral  vote  of  that 
State  numbered  28,  and  the  impracticability  of  nominating 
a  Southern  man,  made  it  necessary,  in  Wise's  opinion,  to 
form  a  political  alliance  with  Pennsylvania,  and  indicated 
Buchanan  as  the  logical  candidate.  The  nomination  of 
Fremont  as  the  Republican  or  Free-soil  candidate  brought 
the  slavery  question  directly  before  the  people,  despite  the 
fact  that  the  American  party  had  the  temerity  to  put 
forward  Fillmore,  and  the  issues  were  clearly  defined. 
Apprehensive  of  what  would  follow  the  election  of  Fre- 


A   CALL   TO   SOUTHERN   GOVERNORS  209 

mont,  Wise  addressed  the  following  letter  to  Governor 
Ligon  of  Maryland :  — 

"  RICHMOND,  VIRGINIA,  September  15,  1856. 

"  To  His  Excellency,  THOMAS  W.  LIGON,  Governor  of 
Maryland  : 

"Dear  Sir  :  —  Events  are  approaching  which  address 
themselves  to  your  responsibilities  and  to  mine  as  chief 
executives  of  slaveholding  States.  Contingencies  may 
soon  happen  which  would  require  preparation  for  the 
worst  of  evils  to  the  people  we  govern.  Ought  we  not 
to  admonish  ourselves,  by  joint  counsel,  of  the  extraor 
dinary  duties  which  may  devolve  upon  us  from  the 
dangers  which  so  palpably  threaten  our  common  peace 
and  safety?  When,  how,  to  what  extent  may  we  act, 
separately  or  unitedly,  to  ward  off  dangers  if  we  can,  to 
meet  them  most  effectually  if  we  must  ?  I  propose  that 
as  early  as  convenient,  the  governors  of  Maryland,  Vir 
ginia,  North  Carolina,  South  Carolina,  Georgia,  Florida, 
Alabama,  Louisiana,  Texas,  Arkansas,  Mississippi,  and 
Tennessee  shall  assemble  at  Raleigh,  North  Carolina,  for 
the  purpose  generally  of  consultation  upon  the  state  of 
the  country,  upon  the  best  means  of  preserving  its  peace, 
and  especially  protecting  the  honor  and  interest  of  the 
slaveholding  States.  I  have  named  the  States  only 
having  Democratic  executives  for  obvious  reasons. 

"  This  should  be  done  as  early  as  possible,  before  the 
presidential  election,  and  I  would  suggest  Monday  the 
13th  of  October  next.  Will  you  please  give  me  an  early 
answer  and  oblige 

"  Yours  most  truly  and  respectfully, 

"HENRY   A.    WISE." 

Similar  letters  were  addressed  to  the  governors  of  the 
other  Southern  States  with  the  exception  of  Kentucky 
and  Missouri. 


210  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

The  meeting  occurred  at  Raleigh,  but  only  the  gov 
ernors  of  North  and  South  Carolina  were  present,  besides 
Wise.  Most  of  them  had  written  letters  approving  the 
objects  of  the  conference,  but  were  prevented  from  at 
tending  ;  others  thought  any  action  unwise,  especially  as 
the  governors  of  Kentucky  and  Missouri,  who  were  not 
Democrats,  had  not  been  invited  to  participate,  and  hence 
the  meeting  would  be  regarded  as  a  mere  Democratic 
movement.  Of  this  conference,  Wise  afterward,  in  1873, 
wrote  in  a  letter  to  Henry  Wilson,  of  Massachusetts  (see 
Wilson's  "  Rise  and  Fall  of  the  Slave  Power,"  Vol.  II., 
page  521) :  "  My  anxious  desire  and  most  zealous  motive 
was  to  do  all  I  could  to  prevent  intestine  war  and  guard 
against  disunion  ;  and,  if  that  could  not  be  done,  to  pro 
vide  for  the  safety  and  protection  of  Virginia  in  a  war 
which  might  come,  and  which  I  was  sure  would  come, 
unless  a  convention  of  the  States  could  be  assembled  to 
avert  its  dangers.  ...  I  shall  die  in  the  conviction  that 
if  a  convention  of  all  the  States  could  have  been  held,  war 
would  have  been  averted." 

No  action  was  taken  at  the  Raleigh  meeting,  though  it 
had  the  effect,  as  Wilson  remarks,  of  alarming  many  con 
servative  men  at  the  North,  who  were  prevented  thereby 
from  voting  for  Fremont.  The  election  of  Buchanan 
over  Fremont  served  to  postpone  for  a  time  the  conflict, 
which  otherwise  might  have  sooner  arisen. 

We  may  be  pardoned  if  we  narrate  here  an  episode  in  the 
history  of  the  slavery  contest  but  little  known,  and  which  is 
of  interest,  if  for  no  other  reason  than  on  account  of  its  pro 
jector,  and  the  line  of  speculation  that  it  awakened  as  to  what 
might  have  been  its  results.  In  the  year  1856  Eli  Thayer  of 
Massachusetts,  the  able  and  indefatigable  head  of  the  Emi 
grant  Aid  Society,  had  completed  his  work  of  colonization 
in  Kansas  and  made  sure  the  triumph  of  the  free-state 


THE  EMIGRANT   AID   SOCIETY  211 

men.  It  was  the  purpose  of  Thayer,  after  his  victory  over 
the  pro-slavery  sympathizers,  to  turn  his  attention  to  Vir 
ginia,  and  buy  up  large  tracts  of  land  in  that  State  and 
settle  them  with  members  of  the  Society.  It  was  even 
contemplated  to  purchase  whole  counties  in  tidewater 
Virginia,  which  had  become  thinly  populated  and  worn 
out  by  the  exhaustive  methods  of  agriculture  in  vogue 
there,  and  fill  them  with  free-state  settlers.  Early  in 
1857,  after  lecturing  at  various  points  throughout  the 
western  portion  of  the  State,  Thayer  founded  a  colony 
called  Ceredo,  in  Wayne  County,  on  the  Ohio  River. 
Here  a  large  sum  of  money  was  expended,  and  over  five 
hundred  settlers  were  located.  Wise  was  appealed  to  by 
Albert  Gallatin  Jenkins,  a  resident  of  Green  Bottom,  not 
far  distant,  to  prevent  the  founding  of  an  abolition  colony 
in  Virginia,  and  in  reply  to  a  letter  from  the  latter  wrote : 

"  RICHMOND,  VIRGINIA,  August  24,  1857. 

"DEAR  SIR:  —  Yours  of  the  15th  inst.  was  received 
this  morning,  and  I  reply  to  it  immediately,  that  4  Mr. 
Eli  Thayer's  emigration  scheme,'  in  western  Virginia  or 
anywhere  else,  has  never  been  submitted  in  any  manner 
whatever  to  my  approval  or  disapproval.  What  the 
scheme  is,  for  any  part  of  Virginia  or  elsewhere,  I  am  not 
definitely  informed,  and  the  agents  of  no  such  emigration 
scheme  have  ever  addressed  me  on  the  subject,  directly  or 
indirectly,  and  its  friends,  whoever  they  be,  have  no 
authority  whatever  for  the  use  of  my  name  in  its  favor. 
A  newspaper  report  to  that  effect,  in  some  Cincinnati 
journal,  was  lately  contradicted  by  the  Richmond  Enquirer, 
with  my  authority. 

"  I  am  4  cognizant '  of  no  '  matter  appertaining  to  the 
origin,  objects,  and  probable  results  of  this  enterprise,' 
which  have  not  been  given  to  the  public.  Officially,  I 


212  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY    A.  WISE 

have  nothing  to  do  with  the  subject,  except  it  be  made 
apparent,  by  proper  and  sufficient  proof,  that  combinations 
or  associations  are  formed,  in  or  out  of  the  State,  to  cause 
invasion  or  incite  insurrection,  or  to  prevent  the  execution 
of  our  laws,  especially  those  for  the  protection  of  property 
in  slaves.  Any  association  or  combination,  formed  under 
any  pretext,  coming  into  our  limits  with  the  avowed  or 
manifest  purpose  and  act  of  impairing  the  value  of  prop 
erty  in  slaves,  would  be  against  the  laws  of  the  Com 
monwealth,  which  I  will  'take  care  shall  be  faithfully 
executed.'  No  such  association  or  combination  has  my 
approbation,  and  it  will  have  to  encounter  all  the  power 
vested  in  me  by  the  constitution  to  resist  and  overcome 
any  such  unlawful  intent  or  purpose,  and  to  enforce  the 
execution  of  the  laws.  But  in  saying  this,  I  disclaim  all 
meaning  to  interfere  with  peaceful  and  lawful  immigra 
tion  into  the  limits  of  our  Commonwealth.  Our  State 
settlers  do  develop  her  vast  resources ;  and  I  would,  from 
policy  and  without  fear,  encourage  immigrants  to  come  to 
our  waste  lands  and  improve  them,  to  increase  our  popula 
tion,  our  wealth,  our  revenue,  and  our  State  and  Federal 
strength.  And  so  conscious  am  I  of  the  power  of  Virginia 
to  protect  and  defend  her  institutions  and  the  persons  and 
property  of  her  citizens,  in  her  own  limits  at  least,  that  I 
would  neither  feel  nor  betray  any  fear,  if  felt,  which  would 
repel  lawful  immigration  and  settlement.  That  State  must 
be  weak,  indeed,  which  would,  from  mere  apprehension, 
arrest  the  progress  of  her  development  lest  she  could  not 
preserve  her  peace,  protect  her  persons  and  property,  and 
enforce  her  laws.  I  have  no  fear,  therefore,  that  any  emi 
gration  scheme  intended  to  affect  Virginia  can  endanger 
either  her  honor,  her  possessions,  or  her  peace  in  her  own 
limits. 

"  No  matter  what  may  be  the  newspaper  rumors,  how- 


LETTER   TO    ALBERT   G.    JENKINS  213 

ever  calculated  to  alarm  the  timid  or  to  excite  the  excit 
able,  or  to  add  fuel  to  the  fires  of  agitation,  my  counsel  is 
calmly  to  invite  settlers  to  our  lands ;  to  offer  them  every 
facility  and  favor  of  good  neighborhood  ;  to  give  them  all 
the  protection  of  peace  ;  to  encourage  them  in  increasing 
plenty,  by  multiplying  the  hands  and  vocations  of  labor  - 
and  to  allow  them  to  abide  with  us  under  our  laws  so  long 
as  they  will  obey  those  laws,  and  respect  all  rights  under 
them.  Indeed,  I  know  of  no  laws,  State  or  Federal,  which 
do  not  require  this  rule  to  be  observed  toward  all  immi 
grants  of  good  behavior.  The  right  to  remove  from  one 
State  and  to  settle  in  another,  complying  with  the  laws,  is 
a  reciprocal  right  of  the  citizens  of  the  respective  States, 
under  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States.  Why  not 
calmly  wait,  then,  for  the  fact,  as  it  may  arise  ?  If  the  act 
and  the  intent  of  immigration  shall  manifest  themselves 
to  be  unlawful,  we  have  the  power  to  enforce  the  laws ; 
and  if  lawful,  we  ought  to  encourage  settlement,  and  are 
bound  to  extend  protection  to  innocent  and  lawful  immi 
grants.  At  all  events,  let  us  be  manly  in  our  actions  and 
not  move  from  the  promptings  of  mere  apprehension  and 
fears. 

"  These  are  briefly  my  views,  and  I  am  grateful  to  you 
for  the  opportunity  of  calling  them  forth. 

"  Yours  truly, 

"  HENRY  A.  WISE. 

"  HON.  ALBERT  G.  JENKINS." 

It  is  hardly  necessary  to  add  that  the  Ceredo  colony 
was  never  interfered  with,  and  the  enterprise  only  lan 
guished  on  account  of  the  lack  of  support  from  the 
North. 

Another  letter  of  Wise,  equally  as  characteristic  of  the 
man  as  that  above  quoted,  was  one  addressed  to  Mrs. 


214  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

Sarah  J.  Hale,  of  Philadelphia,  editor  of  the  "  Lady's 
Book,"  in  response  to  a  request  from  her  that  he 
appoint  a  day  of  thanksgiving,  by  virtue  of  his  office 
as  governor. 

"  RICHMOND,  VIRGINIA,  September  24,  1856. 

"  MADAM  :  —  ...  Never  was  there  a  time  when  this 
nation  more  needed  the  efficacy  of  prayer,  against  some  of 
the  preaching  and  practices  of  some  of  the  churches  which 
profess  to  be  Christian,  than  at  this  critical  period  of  im 
minent  peril.  But  Virginia  is  peculiarly  opposed  to  any 
the  remotest  connection  between  the  action  of  Church  and 
State.  We  recognize  Christianity  in  every  form  of  State, 
except  in  any  form  of  worship ;  that  is  left  to  the  people, 
freely  to  be  exercised  without  any  interference  by  the 
State,  and  the  State  permits  no  interference  with  it  by  any 
religions  among  the  people.  I  cannot  but  approve  of  this 
disconnection,  to  this  extent,  and  will  never  venture  in 
this  State  or  Republic  to  invoke  religion,  officially  or  politi 
cally,  on  any  occasion  except  as  the  laws  authorize,  as  a 
sanction  of  appeals  to  the  consciences  of  men  and  to  the 
forms  of  certain  proceedings,  judicial  or  otherwise.  I  bow 
to  God  and  His  Son  Jesus  Christ  and  to  His  Holy  Spirit 
in  all  things ;  but  the  governor  of  Virginia  is  not  author 
ized  by  her  laws  to  call  upon  the  people  to  bow  to  authority 
in  heaven,  or  on  earth,  besides  their  own  authority.  This 
is  no  infidel  or  anti-Christian  sentiment,  but  one  founded 
on  a  zealous  sense  of  preserving  the  Church  pure  from  the 
State,  and  the  State  free  from  the  Church :  upon  the  rule 
to  render  unto  Caesar  the  things  which  are  Caesar's,  and 
unto  God  the  things  which  are  God's,  and  to  keep  spiritual 
things  unspotted  from  the  world.  This  theatrical,  national 
claptrap  of  Thanksgiving  has  aided  other  causes  in  setting 
thousands  of  pulpits  to  preaching  '  Christian  politics,'  instead 


INTERNAL   IMPROVEMENTS  215 

of  humbly  letting  the  carnal  kingdom  alone  and  preaching 
singly  Christ  crucified. 

"  You  are  welcome  to  publish  this  hasty  letter." 

At  the  period  of  Wise's  occupancy  of  the  governorship 
of  Virginia,  the  subject  of  internal  improvements  consumed 
a  large  share  of  public  attention.  For  a  long  period  the 
development  of  the  Commonwealth  had  been  almost  solely 
on  agricultural  lines,  and  that  of  the  most  primitive  and 
wasteful  character,  the  opposite  of  intensive  farming  or 
improved  agriculture.  Though  manufacturing  enterprises 
had  been  undertaken  at  an  early  period,  they  had  never 
flourished  on  any  large  scale,  as  they  were  unsuited  to  the 
economic  and  social  condition  of  the  people.  At  the 
present  time,  it  hardly  appears  to  admit  of  a  reasonable 
doubt  that  this  state  of  things  was  directly  traceable  to  the 
institution  of  negro  slavery ;  and  that  but  for  that  incubus, 
Virginia,  with  her  wealth  of  minerals,  water-power,  and 
lumber,  would  have  rivalled  Pennsylvania  and  Ohio,  if  not 
New  York,  in  her  development  in  wealth  and  population. 
At  a  commercial  convention  held  in  the  city  of  Richmond, 
as  far  back  as  the  year  1838,  the  report  of  the  committee 
on  manufactures  showed  that  there  was  at  that  time  about 
$11,000,000  invested  in  manufacturing  enterprises.  Wheel 
ing,  Petersburg,  Fredericksburg,  and  Richmond  were  the 
chief  manufacturing  points,  and  the  largest  amount  was 
invested  in  the  first-named  place,  which  was  located  on  the 
Ohio,  and  practically  a  western  town.  Petersburg,  which 
was  largely  settled  by  a  class  of  thrifty  Scotchmen,  had 
been  the  first  town  east  of  the  mountains  to  embark  in 
manufacturing,  and  was  followed  later  by  Fredericksburg 
and  Richmond.  The  report  of  the  committee  alluded  to 
the  natural  advantages  of  the  State  for  manufacturing,  viz. 
coal,  iron,  and  limestone  in  wonderful  juxtaposition,  mild 


216  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY    A.  WISE 

climate,  water-power,  cheap  labor,  etc.,  and  advocated 
internal  improvements  and  improved  transportation  and 
banking  facilities.  That  there  was  great  need  of  these 
last  was  unquestionably  true.  There  were  no  home  lines 
of  vessels  plying  between  Virginia  ports  and  Europe,  or 
South  America,  and  foreign  ship-owners  derived  the  profit 
from  whatever  commerce  was  carried  on. 

In  a  letter  addressed  to  a  prominent  citizen  of  Norfolk, 
on  the  subject  of  a  line  of  steamers  between  Virginia  arid 
South  America,  Wise  wrote,  under  the  date  of  October 
15,  1858:  "...  When  minister  of  the  United  States  at 
the  Court  of  Brazil  for  nearly  four  years,  from  the  begin 
ning  of  1844  to  the  end  of  1847,  whilst  Gallego  and  Haxall 
flour  commanded  twenty-four  milreis  per  barrel,  the  Trieste, 
Chili,  Cincinnati,  Philadelphia,  New  York,  and  Baltimore 
flour  commanded  twenty-two,  twenty,  and  eighteen  milreis, 
on  an  average.  The  French  bakers  bought  the  Richmond 
flour  as  a  priming  for  their  bread,  so  superior  was  it  in 
whiteness  and  gluten,  and,  under  proper  inspection,  it  con 
tinues  to  command  the  markets  of  South  America.  But 
the  ships  which  carry  that  flour  from  Virginia  to  Rio  are 
all  built  in  Baltimore,  New  York,  or  further  north.  There 
they  are  manned,  rigged,  and  victualled.  They  come  to 
City  Point  for  our  flour  and  spend  nothing  amongst  us 
while  loading,  for  they  come  provided  for  the  voyage. 
Their  owners  make  the  freight,  the  dunnage,  and  exchange, 
and,  above  all,  they  bring  back  the  return  cargoes,  not  to 
us,  but  to  Baltimore  or  New  York,  to  be  distributed,  and 
the  coffee  comes  through  these  ports  to  our  people  at  retail 
prices.  Until  lately,  I  repeat,  not  a  pound  was  imported 
into  Virginia,  not  a  Virginia  bottom  was  employed  in  this 
trade,  and  not  a  port  or  place  of  Virginia  sent  a  bag  to  the 
interior,  but  we  were  consumers  at  retail  prices  in  the  very 
city  of  Richmond  which  ground  the  flour  that  bought  the 


THE  MATERIAL   CONDITION   OF   VIRGINIA  217 

coffee."  The  truth  contained  in  these  statements  had 
resulted  in  a  realization  of  their  situation  by  the  merchants 
of  Richmond,  and  prior  to  the  war  they  had  invested  a 
considerable  sum  in  vessels  employed  in  the  Brazilian 
trade,  and  Richmond  had  become  a  large  coffee  market. 
In  a  letter  to  E.  Lacouture,  Esq.,  which  was  laid  before 
the  legislature,  on  the  subject  of  the  establishment  of  a  line 
of  vessels  between  Virginia  and  France,  Wise  wrote  as 
follows  of  the  material  condition  of  Virginia,  under  date  of 
April  12,  1857  :  - 

"  In  the  first  place,  I  call  your  attention  to  the  fact  that 
our  first  early  settlers  were  all  planters,  and  the  earliest 
interest  of  our  people  was  a  plantation  interest.  This 
was  something  more  characteristic  than  an  agricultural 
interest  simply.  It  was  an  occupation  of  land  in  very 
large  extent,  by  liberal  proprietors,  who  cultivated  staple 
crops  of  tobacco,  grain,  and  cotton,  by  slave  operatives, 
whom  they  were  encouraged  by  Great  Britain  to  import 
from  Africa,  during  the  whole  time  of  our  colonial  ex 
istence.  This  in  itself  was  opposed  to  the  concentration 
of  capital  and  population  necessary  to  generate  trade  and 
commerce. 

"  At  the  same  time  the  mother  country  discouraged  the 
navigation  and  commercial  interest  of  all  the  colonies,  and 
monopolized  the  carrying  trade  almost  entirely  to  herself. 

"  Again :  Looking  at  the  map  of  Virginia,  you  see  the 
whole  Atlantic  lowlands  watered  by  the  Potomac,  the 
Rappahannock,  the  Piankatank,  the  rivers  of  Mobjack 
Bay,  the  York,  the  James,  and  the  Roanoke,  streams  rising 
in  the  great  Appalachian  chain  of  mountains  and  running 
a  few  miles  only  apart  from  each  other  in  parallel  lines, 
from  west  to  east,  and  all  of  them  except  the  last  empty 
ing  into  the  grand  reservoir  of  the  Chesapeake  Bay,  which 
entirely  cuts  off  the  main  eastern  peninsula.  Thus  all  the 


218  THE   LIFE    OF   HENRY    A.  WISE 

eastern  and  first  settled  part  of  the  territory  was  found 
naturally  divided  into  no  less  than  seven  distinct  penin 
sulas,  especially  from  each  other,  by  eight  considerable 
bodies  of  navigable  waters.  Up  all  these  waters  the  ton 
nage  of  Great  Britain  came  and  found  facilities  of  ship 
ment  everywhere,  deep  water,  wharfage,  and  accessibility 
to  navigation  up  to  the  very  steps  of  the  Blue  Ridge,  or 
the  Alleghanies. 

"  This  also  tended  to  diffuse  population  and  capital  and 
prevented  the  concentration  of  either  at  any  one  point,  to 
form  a  city  for  purposes  of  commerce.  Every  plantation 
found  a  landing  at  its  own  fields,  or  near  in  its  neighbor 
hood,  and  but  a  shipload  had  to  be  collected  at  any  one 
locality ;  —  such  was  the  convenience  to  and  from  market 
of  the  earliest  settlements  in  eastern  Virginia. 

"  Again :  When  population  moved  westward,  it  crossed 
the  Blue  Ridge  Mountains  into  a  rich  and  beautiful  valley 
running  north  and  south,  which  has  no  natural  outlet  but 
at  its  northern  terminus  in  our  limits,  and  it  had  to  pour 
its  products  out  of  our  marts  into  those  of  the  adjoining 
State  of  Maryland,  at  the  head  of  the  Chesapeake  Bay. 
And  when  it  crossed  the  next  and  parallel  ridge  of  the 
Alleghanies,  it  settled  upon  rivers  flowing  westward  into 
the  great  basin  of  the  Mississippi,  and  had  to  send  its 
products  by  the  Monongahela  and  the  Guyandotte  and  the 
two  Kanawhas  and  the  Sandy,  to  float  on  the  Ohio,  to 
build  up  Pittsburg  and  Cincinnati  and  New  Orleans,  cities 
of  Pennsylvania,  Ohio,  and  Louisiana. 

"  Thus,  by  every  geographical  and  geological  cause  were 
our  people  segregated  into  separate  communities  and  di 
vided  from  each  other  and  all  mutual  commercial  depend 
ency.  Thus  at  the  beginning,  from  the  character  of  their 
settlers  and  interests  and  of  their  operatives  in  labor,  from 
the  nature  of  their  various  territory,  from  both  physical 


DEVELOPMENT   OF    VIRGINIA  219 

convenience  and  necessity,  the  habitudes  of  our  people 
were  formed  anti-commercial.  They  grew  up  a  planting 
and  purely  pastoral  people,  segregated  and  isolated  in  a 
way  utterly  opposed  to  the  concentration  of  population 
and  capital,  to  the  building  of  cities  and  of  ships,  and  to 
the  encouragement  of  the  mechanic  arts,  all  depending 
upon  commerce.  .  .  .  By  the  operation  of  these  causes 
we  have  begun  and  kept  ourselves  an  agricultural  people, 
producers  of  the  raw  material,  relying  on  manual  labor  in 
planting  and  grazing,  and  as  yet  left  commerce  and  mining 
and  manufacturing  and  the  mechanic  arts  to  the  concen 
trated  population  and  capital  and  skill  of  other  people. 
Thereby  we  have  lost  nothing,  but  the  world  has  gained 
a  great  deal,  and  we  have  fulfilled  a  mighty  destiny  in  the 
moral  and  political  field,  greater  than  the  achievements  of 
trade  and  arts  in  the  physics  of  other  States.  We  have  no 
cities,  but  we  have  a  meliorated  country  populace,  civilized 
in  the  solitude,  gracious  in  the  amenities  of  life,  and  re 
fined  and  conservative  in  social  habits.  We  have  little 
associated,  but  more  individual  wealth  than  any  equal 
number  of  white  population  in  the  United  States.  We 
have  no  mechanic  arts,  but  are  better  able,  en  masse,  to  own 
their  utensils  than  the  people  are  who  manufacture  them. 
Our  labor  in  the  past  has  been  and  at  present  is  better 
employed  than  to  manufacture  them  ourselves.  We  have 
no  commerce,  that  is,  we  are  not  our  own  carriers,  but  we 
supply  the  very  pabulum  of  commerce,  which  would  not 
be  so  largely  and  well  supplied  if  we  were  to  turn  traders. 
We  are  not  wanting  in  a  body  of  laboring  white  yeomanry, 
but  our  operatives  are  chiefly  slaves,  an  inferior  race,  who 
are  blessed  by  a  patriarchal  government  of  benign  domestic 
rule  which  supervises  every  want  and  provides  for  it ;  and 
this  affords  a  class  of  masters  who  have  leisure  for  the 
cultivation  of  morals,  manners,  philosophy,  and  politics, 


220  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

which  has  given  the  nation  its  heroes  and  sages  and  its 
blessings  of  free  government,  and  its  wisdom  of  adminis 
tration  in  the  field  and  in  the  cabinet." 

The  above  is,  on  the  whole,  an  accurate  description  of 
the  causes  that  had  led  to  the  then  condition  of  Virginia ; 
but  in  adverting  to  the  opportunities  for  culture  among  the 
country  gentry  of  the  State  and  the  many  good  traits  of 
manhood  nurtured  under  its  patriarchal  system,  the  im 
portant  fact,  generally  lost  sight  of  by  Southern  statesmen, 
was  overlooked ;  that  the  commerce  and  manufactures  of 
the  North  were  building  up  great  cities,  which  would  in 
time  become  the  centres  of  civilization  on  our  continent. 

Wise's  first  regular  message  to  the  legislature  was 
addressed  to  that  body  upon  its  assembling  in  Decem 
ber,  1857,  and  he  did  not  neglect  to  urge  upon  them,  in 
accordance  with  the  course  of  his  predecessor,  Governor 
Johnson,  the  need  of  liberal  appropriations  for  railways, 
turnpikes,  and  canals.  When  we  consider  not  only  the 
financial  troubles  of  this  period,  but  the  fact  that  Virginia 
had  no  great  centres  of  trade  within  her  limits,  and  that 
her  people  had  always  followed  agricultural  and  not  com 
mercial  pursuits,  the  material  development  of  the  Com 
monwealth  between  the  years  1845  and  1860  was  truly 
remarkable.  In  1848  energetic  men,  residing  in  the 
southwestern  section  of  the  State,  obtained  a  charter  to 
cross  the  mountains  into  Tennessee,  with  the  Virginia  and 
Tennessee  railroad,  by  many  regarded  as  a  chimerical  proj 
ect  at  the  time ;  and  the  year  following,  the  officers  of  the 
Virginia  Central  road  (now  the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio) 
amended  their  charter,  with  the  purpose  of  traversing  the 
Blue  Ridge  and  Alleghanies,  and  reaching  out  to  the  Ohio 
River.  Many  other  lines  of  railway  and  works  of  improve 
ment  had  been  begun ;  but,  owing  to  the  thinly  settled  char 
acter  of  the  country  and  lack  of  great  individual  wealth, 


PROPOSITION  FOR   INCREASE   OF   REVENUE          221 

liberal  subscriptions  on  the  part  of  the  Commonwealth 
were  necessary  to  successfully  complete  them.  Unfortu 
nately  for  the  State,  among  other  so-called  improvements, 
to  which  larger  appropriations  were  made,  was  the  James 
River  and  Kanawha  Canal,  the  pet  enterprise  of  Washing 
ton,  in  which  millions  were  sunk,  after  Moncure  Robinson 
and  other  competent  engineers  had  pointed  out  its  inutil- 
ity  in  an  era  of  railway  transportation.  Wise,  like  many 
other  Virginians,  still  adhered  to  the  idea  of  the  union  of 
the  Atlantic  seaboard  and  the  Ohio,  through  this  medium. 
Among  the  means  advocated  by  him  for  increasing  the 
revenue  were  a  tax  on  the  oyster  grounds  and  a  system 
of  State  insurance  analogous  to  the  Swiss  method.  His 
views  on  these  subjects  are  embraced  in  the  following 
extracts  from  a  message  laid  before  the  legislature :  — 

"  By  the  laws  of  the  State  from  1780  down  to  this  date, 
*all  unappropriated  lands  on  the  bay  of  Chesapeake,  on 
the  seashore,  or  on  the  shores  of  rivers  and  creeks,  and 
all  the  beds  of  rivers  and  creeks,  continue  to  be  common 
to  the  people  of  the  State.  And  the  limits  and  bounds  of 
the  several  tracts  of  land  lying  on  the  seashore,  the  Chesa 
peake  Bay  and  the  rivers  and  creeks  thereof,  and  the  rights 
and  privileges  of  the  owners  of  such  lands,  shall  extend  to 
ordinary  low-water  mark,  but  no  further,  unless  where  a 
creek  or  river,  or  some  part  thereof,  is  comprised  within 
the  limits  of  a  lawful  survey.'  Thus,  from  low-water  mark 
outwards  into  the  waters  of  the  State,  their  beds  have  been 
reserved  as  public  domain,  and  been  made  continually  com 
mon  to  the  people  of  this  State.  And  by  the  unvarying 
decisions  of  the  circuit  and  supreme  judges  of  the  federal 
courts  down  to  the  case  of  Smith,  owner  of  the  sloop 
Volant,  plaintiff  in  error  vs.  the  State  of  Maryland,  Decem 
ber  term  of  the  supreme  court  of  the  United  States  1855, 
*  whatever  soil  below  low- water  mark  is  the  subject  of  ex- 


222  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

elusive  propriety  and  ownership,  belongs  to  the  State  on 
whose  maritime  border  and  within  whose  territory  it  lies.' 
And  this  soil  is  held  by  the  State  subject  to  and  in  trust 
for  the  enjoyment  of  certain  public  rights,  among  which 
is  the  common  liberty  of  taking  fish,  as  well  shellfish  as 
floating  fish.  And  this  right  is  a  jus  publicum  to  the  citi 
zens  of  the  State  to  which  the  soil  belongs,  and  that  State 
may  regulate  the  enjoyment  of  the  right  or  the  fisheries. 

"  The  right  to  pass  laws  regulating  navigation  and  its 
incidents  belongs  to  Congress ;  but  the  regulation  of  taking 
fish,  floating  or  shell,  in  its  waters,  belongs  to  each  State 
respectively.  Virginia  may  not  prohibit  the  citizens  of 
other  States  from  transporting  her  fish  in  their  vessels; 
but  she  may  reserve  the  monopoly  of  taking  her  fish  in  her 
own  waters  to  her  own  citizens.  And  to  guard  the  enjoy 
ment  of  that  exclusive  right  and  to  preserve  the  fish  and 
their  spawn  from  destruction,  she  may  pass  regulations  and 
levy  a  tax  from  which  she  may  derive  a  re  venue. 

"  The  smallest  tax  upon  the  oyster  fisheries  in  her  limits 
would  yield  a  very  considerable  annual  revenue.  The  soil 
upon  which  the  oysters  grow  extends  over  a  space  of  more 
than  2000  square  miles.  About  16,000  tons  of  licensed 
vessels  belonging  to  our  citizens,  and  at  least  five  times 
that  number  of  tons  belonging  to  citizens  of  other  States, 
making  in  all  96,000  tons  per  annum  are  engaged  in  the 
oyster  trade  of  Virginia.  That  amount  of  tonnage  ac 
counts  for  more  than  25  to  30  millions  of  bushels  of 
oysters  taken  and  carried  away  from  the  public  soil  of 
Virginia  every  year.  The  oysters  are  worth  from  20 
cents  per  bushel  at  the  place  where  taken,  to  50  cents 
per  bushel  in  the  market  at  wholesale.  A  tax  of  two 
cents  per  bushel  on  25  millions  of  bushels  would  yield  a 
gross  revenue  of  $500,000  per  annum,  to  be  collected  under 
inspection  laws,  by  not  more  than  four  small  steam  cutters, 


STATE   INSURANCE  223 

at  an  annual  cost  of  not  more  than  120,000  per  annum  for 
them,  and  a  cost  of  fees  for  licenses  not  exceeding  $80,000 
per  annum,  leaving  a  net  revenue  for  this  jus  publicum  of 
1450,000  per  annum. 

"  The  second  involuntary  source  of  revenue  is  the  policy 
of  insurance  of  all  lives  and  property  of  her  own  citizens, 
by  the  State.  It  is  strange  that  whilst  banking  and  lot 
teries,  and  like  subjects,  have  been  placed  by  legislation 
within  the  category  of  sumptuary  laws,  the  subject  of 
insurance  has  been  omitted  by  the  States  in  a  confederacy, 
cutting  them  off  from  revenues  by  duties,  customs,  and 
excises.  Why  not  allow  our  citizens  to  replenish  their 
own  treasury,  by  becoming  mutual  insurers  to  each  other  ? 
Why  not  resort  to  a  source  of  revenue  where  the  very  tax 
protects  and  insures  the  very  property  which  it  burdens  ? 
Why  not  allow  the  contributions,  which  are  now  volun 
tarily  poured  in  large  sums  into  the  coffers  of  private 
companies,  chiefly  out  of  the  State,  to  be  voluntarily 
poured  into  the  State  treasury  to  lessen  involuntary  tax 
ation  ?  Why  not  let  the  public  expenditures  be  borne  by 
the  wealth  of  the  State,  willing  to  pay  them,  rather  than 
set  the  poor,  who  are  unable  and  unwilling  to  bear  them, 
clamoring  against  taxes,  which  must  now  alone  uphold 
public  credit  and  construct  our  public  works?  There 
can  be  no  more  fraud  and  favoritism  against  a  policy  by 
the  State  than  against  a  policy  by  private  companies; 
and  allowing  the  largest  percentage  for  losses  by  both, 
still  a  large  revenue  would  be  yielded.  There  need  be 
no  cost  for  assessment  of  value  insured,  for  the  rule 
need  be  to  pay  only  for  actual  loss  within  the  amount 
insured.  The  cost  of  inquiry  as  to  actual  loss  may  be  as 
simple  and  as  cheap  as  a  writ  of  ad  quod  damnum  to  ascer 
tain  by  the  verdict  of  a  jury :  '  Is  there  fraud  ?  Is  there 
gross  neglect?  What  is  the  amount  of  loss?'  Subjects 


224  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

not  known  to  private  insurance  may  be  embraced  in  a 
State's  policy.  We  live  in  an  age  of  the  lucifer  match, 
and  arson  is  too  easily  perpetrated  not  to  be  a  crime  re 
markably  rife  in  this  day  and  night.  Wheat  in  the  garner, 
crops  in  the  field,  as  well  as  houses,  might  be  insured. 
Policies  would  be  multiplied  in  proportion  to  the  greater 
guarantee  by  State  rather  than  by  private  security.  No 
compulsion  would  be  necessary,  or  allowed.  All  would 
be  free  to  insure  or  not,  but  if  they  insure,  prohibit  them 
from  negotiating  a  policy  on  any  property  or  life  in  the 
State,  except  at  the  office  of  the  State  treasury,  at  every 
country  court-house." 

The  plan  of  State  insurance  above  outlined  has  never 
been  acted  upon  in  Virginia,  and  in  all  probability  never 
will  be ;  but  it  is  a  strange  fact  that  up  to  the  present  time 
no  oyster  law  has  been  enacted,  which  while  preserving 
that  great  source  of  wealth,  the  oyster  grounds  and  rocks, 
would  at  the  same  time  yield  the  State  an  ample  revenue, 
such  as  it  is  well  capable  of  producing.  Whenever  the 
subject  has  been  introduced  in  the  legislature,  the  inter 
ests  of  the  State  at  large  have  been  sacrificed  to  those  of  a 
few  thousand  tongmen  and  fishermen  dwelling  along  the 
salt  water.  "The  oyster  banks,"  wrote  Wise  in  1857, 
"  will  pay  a  better  bonus  than  the  banks  of  a  paper  cur 
rency.  An  oyster  mine  is  a  richer  source  of  profit  to  labor 
than  any  mine  of  coal,  copper,  silver,  or  gold.  If  our 
oyster  beds  had  been  mines  of  metals,  they  would  not 
have  been  so  neglected  by  legislation  as  a  source  of 
revenue."  At  another  time  he  declared  that  the  game 
and  fish  of  the  Chesapeake  and  its  tributaries  were  more 
valuable  than  the  gold  of  California,  and  it  is  possible  that 
time  may  yet  prove  this  claim  to  be  much  nearer  the  truth 
than  one  who  has  not  investigated  the  subject  would 
suppose. 


THE   STATE   MILITIA   SYSTEM  225 

Among  the  subjects  to  which  the  attention  of  the  legis 
lature  was  early  directed  by  Wise  was  the  need  of  a  re 
organization  of  the  State  militia  system,  which  at  that 
time  was  weak  and  inefficient ;  and  he  also  strenuously 
urged  the  manufacture  and  purchase  of  modern  muskets, 
those  at  that  date,  with  a  few  exceptions,  being  flint-locks 
of  the  most  antiquated  pattern.  These  he  recommended 
should  be  altered  to  percussion,  threaded  in  the  barrel  to 
shoot  a  conical  ball  and  be  made  self-priming.  It  was  not, 
however,  until  after  the  period  of  the  John  Brown  raid, 
in  the  autumn  of  1859,  that  the  legislature  awoke  to 
the  need  of  a  properly  organized  and  equipped  body  of 
militia. 

On  the  subject  of  the  supply  of  arms  at  this  period, 
Wise  wrote  in  after  years:1  "I  looked  carefully  to  the 
State  Armory ;  and  whilst  I  had  the  selection  of  the  State 
quota  of  arms,  I  was  particular  to  take  field  ordinance  in 
stead  of  altered  muskets ;  and  when  I  left  the  gubernato 
rial  chair  there  were  in  the  State  Armory,  at  Richmond, 
85,000  stand  of  infantry  arms  and  130  field-pieces  of  artil 
lery,  besides  $30,000  worth  of  new  revolving  arms,  pur 
chased  from  Colt. 

"My  decided  opinion  was  that  a  preparation  of  the 
Southern  States  in  full  panoply  of  arms  and  prompt  action 
would  have  prevented  civil  war.  The  story  is  told,  and 
still  believed  by  some,  that  Mr.  Floyd,  whilst  Secretary 
of  War  under  Mr.  Buchanan,  distributed  a  large  supply  of 
arms  to  the  Southern  States.  The  story  is  a  doubtful  one  ; 
but,  if  true,  it  is  certain  that  none  of  the  arms  were  sup 
plied  to  Virginia,  and  the  misfortune  of  this  State  was 
that  her  whole  militia  system  had  been  destroyed  by  an 
unprecedented  dereliction  of  duty  and  by  the  folly  of  her 
legislature.  A  prompt,  bold,  defiant,  armed  multitude 

1 "  Seven  Decades  of  the  Union,"  page  250. 
Q 


THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

would  have  prevented  war,  I  repeat,  but  the  peace  policy 
prevailed  in  Virginia ;  whilst  the  cotton  States  were  bent 
on  what  they  insanely  imagined  would  be  peaceful  seces 
sion, —  mistaking  Cotton  for  King,  or  even  money  or 
credit ! " 

The  financial  troubles,  which  came  to  a  crisis  in  1857, 
retarded  somewhat  the  amount  of  State  appropriations  at 
this  period  to  public  works,  though  the  banks  whose  notes 
were  due  for  revenue  were  required  to  redeem  them  in 
specie,  to  avoid  any  danger  of  a  deficit  in  the  treasury. 
Among  the  reasons  given  by  Wise  for  the  need  of  public 
works  was  the  importance  of  building  up  a  centre 
of  trade  in  Virginia,  which  was  not  possible  without 
them. 

In  alluding  to  the  State  banking  system  he  wrote : 
"The  exchange  is  obliged  to  be  in  favor  of  the  centre. 
Consequently,  when  our  issues  go  to  the  centres  to  pur 
chase  supplies,  they  there  pay  a  discount,  and  then  are 
returned  upon  us  to  draw  specie.  This  double  operation 
of  a  tax  goes  on  against  us  quarterly,  upon  a  large  per 
cent  of  our  circulation.  And  this  tax  is  paid  by  our 
people,  chiefly  for  the  accommodation  of  the  traders  of  the 
large  towns  and  for  the  benefit  of  the  dealers  in  exchange. 
This  makes  the  issue  of  bank  paper  immensely  costly  to  a 
purely  agricultural  people.  If  they  issued  no  paper  of 
their  own,  the  circulation  of  the  centres  would  supply  the 
medium  for  sending  our  products  to  market.  It  would  be 
at  par  at  its  locality  of  issue  and  it  would  not  return 
upon  us  for  specie,  but  would  rather  draw  specie  for  us." 
While  opposed  to  the  revival  of  a  national  bank,  he  favored 
the  adoption  by  the  various  States  of  a  uniform  system, 
without  altering  the  Constitution,  a  financial  scheme  simi 
lar  to  what  in  our  day  has  been  proposed  by  various  com 
mercial  organizations. 


TERRITORIAL   GOVERNMENT  227 

Despite  the  exactions  of  his  office,  Wise  had  found  time 
to  study  attentively  national  affairs ;  and  during  the  spring 
of  1858  wrote  and  published  an  elaborate  historical  and 
constitutional  treatise  on  the  subject  of  "  Territorial  Gov 
ernment."  This  work  was  called  forth  by  a  letter  from 
his  friend,  William  F.  Samford,  Esq.,  of  Auburn,  Alabama, 
requesting  his  views,  and  was  published  in  the  form  of  a 
reply  to  the  latter.  Throughout  its  pages,  he  strenuously 
maintained  that  Congress  not  only  had  the  power,  but  that 
the  duty  devolved  upon  it,  to  protect  the  rights  of  persons 
and  of  property,  including  slaves,  in  the  Territories  of  the 
United  States.  He  argued  that  the  Territories,  however 
acquired,  were  common  to  all,  for  confederate  uses  and 
purposes,  governed  by  Federal  legislation,  and  that  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States  secured  equality  and 
community  of  rights,  privileges,  and  immunities,  within 
their  limits.  In  support  of  this  construction,  he  cited 
numerous  illustrations  from  the  acts  of  Congress  organiz 
ing  various  Territories.  The  treatise,  though  hastily  pre 
pared,  during  intervals  snatched  from  business  cares,  was 
an  able  discussion  of  the  subject  of  the  power  of  Congress 
over  the  Territories  ;  and  will  repay  the  student  of  our  his 
tory  who  has  the  industry  to  peruse  its  pages,  treating  as 
it  does  of  a  theme  no  longer  invested  with  any  degree  of 
popular  interest. 

During  the  autumn  of  1855,  Wise  was  requested  to 
deliver  a  lecture  upon  the  subject  of  slavery,  in  a  course 
held  at  Tremont  Temple,  Boston,  but,  unlike  Robert 
Toombs,  saw  fit  to  decline  the  invitation,  in  the  following 
letter :  — 

"ONLY,  NEAR  ONANCOCK, 

"  Accomack  County,  Virginia,  October  5,  1855. 

"  GENTLEMEN  :  —  On  my  return  home,  after  an  absence 
of  some  days,  I  found  yours  of  the  19th  ult.,  '  respectfully 


228  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.   WISE 

inviting  me  to  deliver  one  of  the  lectures  of  the  course  on 
slavery,  at  Tremont  Temple,  in  the  city  of  Boston,  on 
Thursday  evening,  January  10,  1856 ;  or,  if  that  time  will 
not  suit  my  engagements,  you  request  that  I  will  mention 
at  once  what  Thursday  evening,  between  the  middle  of 
December  and  the  middle  of  March  next,  will  best  accom 
modate  me.' 

44  Now,  gentlemen,  I  desire  to  pay  you  due  respect,  yet 
you  compel  me  to  be  very  plain  with  you  and  to  say  that 
your  request,  in  every  sense,  is  insulting  and  offensive  to 
me.  What  subject  of  slavery  have  you  4 initiated'  lec 
tures  upon?  I  cannot  conceal  it  from  myself  that  you 
have  undertaken,  in  Boston,  to  discuss  and  decide  whether 
my  property  in  Virginia  ought  to  remain  mine  or  not,  and 
whether  it  shall  be  allowed  the  protection  of  laws,  Federal 
and  State,  wherever  it  may  be  carried  or  may  escape  in 
the  United  States ;  or  whether  it  shall  be  destroyed  by  a 
higher  law  than  the  constitutions  and  statutes  ! 

44  Who  are  you,  to  assume  thus  such  a  jurisdiction  over 
a  subject  so  delicate  and  already  fixed  in  its  relation  by  a 
solemn  compact  between  the  States,  and  by  States  which 
are  sovereign  ?  I  will  not  obey  your  summons  nor  recog 
nize  your  jurisdiction.  You  have  no  authority  and  no 
justification  for  thus  calling  me  to  account  at  the  bar  of 
your  tribunal,  and  for  thus  arraigning  an  institution  estab 
lished  by  laws  which  do  not  reach  you  and  which  you  can 
not  reach,  by  calling  on  me  to  defend  it. 

44  You  send  me  a  card,  to  indicate  the  character  of  the 
lectures.  It  reads  :  — 

44  4  Admit  the  bearer  and  lady  to  the  Independent  Lec 
tures  on  Slavery.  Lecture  committee,  S.  G.  Howe,  T. 
Gilbert,  George  F.  Williams,  Henry  T.  Parker,  W.  Wash- 
burn,  B.  B.  Mussey,  W.  B.  Spooner,  James  W.  Stone.' 


REFUSAL  TO   LECTURE   ON   SLAVERY  229 

"  It  is  indorsed : 

"  4  Lectures  at  the  Tremont  Temple,  Boston,  1854-55. 
November  23,  Hon.  Charles  Sumner,  Rev.  John  Pierpont, 
poet.  December  7,  Hon.  Salmon  P.  Chase,  of  Ohio.  Decem 
ber  14,  Hon.  Anson  Burlingame.  December  21,  Wendell 
Phillips,  Esq.  December  28,  Cassius  M.  Clay,  Esq.,  of 
Kentucky.  January  4,  Hon.  Horace  Greeley.  January 
11,  Rev.  Henry  Ward  Beecher.  January  18,  Hon.  John 
P.  Hale.  January  25,  Ralph  Waldo  Emerson,  Esq. 
February  8,  Hon.  Nathaniel  P.  Banks,  Jr.  February  15, 
Hon.  Lewis  D.  Campbell,  of  Ohio.  February  22,  Hon. 
Sam  Houston,  of  Texas.  March  1,  Hon.  David  Wilmot, 
of  Pennsylvania.  March  8,  Hon.  Charles  W.  Upham.' 

"All  Honoralles  and  Squires,  except  those  who  are 
Reverends!  The  card  does  verily  indicate  their  char 
acters  by  simply  naming  them.  And  your  letter,  gentle 
men,  is  franked  by  4C.  Sumner,  U.S.S.'  With  these 
characteristics,  I  am  not  at  a  loss  to  understand  you  and 
your  purposes. 

"  You  say,  '  during  the  next  season,  a  large  number  of 
gentlemen  from  the  South  will  be  invited,'  etc.,  etc.  I 
regret  it,  if  any  others  can  be  found  in  the  slaveholding 
States  to  accept  your  invitation.  You  plead  the  example 
of  General  Houston.  It  is  the  last  I  would  follow.  I 
have  no  doubt  that  you  accorded  very  respectful  attention 
to  him  last  winter  and  were  very  grateful  for  his  services 
in  your  cause. 

"  You  offer  4  one  hundred  and  fifty  dollars  to  be  paid  to 
the  lecturer,  he  bearing  his  own  expenses.'  Let  me  tell 
you  that  Tremont  Temple  cannot  hold  wealth  enough  to 
purchase  one  word  of  discussion  from  me  there,  whether 
mine  here  shall  be  mine  or  not;  but  I  am  ready  to  vol 
unteer,  without  money  and  without  price,  to  suppress  any 
insurrection  and  repel  any  invasion  which  threatens  or 


230  THE   LIFE    OF   HENRY    A.  WISE 

endangers  the  State  Rights  of  Virginia,  or  my  individual 
rights,  under  the  laws  and  constitutions  of  my  country,  or 
the  sacred  Union,  which  binds  Slave  States  and  Free 
States  together,  in  one  bond  of  National  Confederacy  and 
in  separate  bonds  of  Independent  Sovereignties ! 

"In  short,  gentlemen,  I  will  not  deliver  one  of  the 
lectures  of  the  course  on  slavery,  at  the  Tremont  Temple, 
in  Boston,  on  Thursday  evening,  January  10,  1856 ;  and 
there  will  be  no  Thursday  evening  between  the  middle  of 
December  and  the  middle  of  March  next,  or  between  that 
and  doomsday,  which  will  best  accommodate  me  for  that 
purpose. 

"  I  give  you  an  immediate  answer,  and  at  my  earliest 
convenience  indicate  to  you  that  '  the  particular  phase  of 
the  subject '  that  I  will  present  is,  deliberately :  to  fight  if 
we  must. 

"  Your  obedient  servant, 

"HENRY   A.    WISE." 

In  a  different  tone  was  the  following  letter  written 
in  response  to  an  invitation  to  address  the  Mercantile 
Library  Association  of  Boston. 

"ONLY,  NEAR  ONANCOCK,  VIRGINIA, 

"November  11,  1855. 

"  GENTLEMEN  :  —  Yours  of  the  2d  inst.  was  awaiting  my 
arrival  at  home  yesterday,  from  a  temporary  absence  at 
Washington  City.  I  gratefully  acknowledge  the  compli 
ment  of  your  invitation  to  deliver  one  of  a  course  of  lec 
tures,  during  the  present  winter,  before  the  Mercantile 
Library  Association  of  Boston.  I  am  well  assured  of  the 
highly  respectable  character  and  of  the  laudable  objects 
of  your  literary  association,  and  no  body  of  the  kind  could 
have  been  more  honored  than  you  have  been  by  the  illus 
trious  orators  and  statesmen  who  have  shed  upon  your 


ANOTHER  REFUSAL  TO  LECTURE         231 

lectures  the  lights  of  their  great  minds.  I  have  no  doubt, 
too,  of  the  '  cordial  welcome '  I  would  receive  from  4  very 
many '  of  your  hospitable  citizens ;  but  it  is  not  in  my 
power,  gentlemen,  to  accept  your  invitation.  The  situ 
ation  of  my  private  affairs,  and  the  duty  of  preparing  for 
months  to  come  for  new  scenes  of  public  service,  will 
engross  all  my  time  and  attention  the  whole  of  the  coming 
winter.  I  have  been  compelled  to  decline  every  call  of 
the  same  kind  from  many  quarters  in  my  own  State,  and 
other  States  besides  yours. 

"  I  sincerely  regret  this  the  more,  because  I  have  never 
yet  set  my  foot  on  the  beloved  soil  of  that  portion  of  my 
country  called  New  England.  This  has  not  been  owing 
to  any  antagonism  on  my  part  toward  that  favored  sec 
tion.  Massachusetts,  especially,  I  have  been  taught  to  ven 
erate  and  cherish  as  the  elder  sister  of  Virginia.  When 
I  reflect  upon  their  attitudes  and  relations  in  the  darkness 
and  gloom  of  the  night  of  revolution  ;  when  I  listen  to 
their  hails,  sister  to  sister  —  Virginia  and  Massachusetts, 
Massachusetts  to  Virginia  —  in  the  'times  which  tried 
men's  souls '  ;  when  I  watch  the  fires  kindling  on  the 
heights  of  Boston,  and  see  Virginia  going  forth  across  the 
rivers  and  over  the  land,  by  the  sea,  leading  her  best-be 
loved  son  by  the  hand,  dripping  blood  and  tears  at  every 
step  there  and  back,  leaving  him  there  on  post  to  guard 
your  very  city,  and  to  make  the  oppressors  evacuate  it ; 
and  when  I  contrast  this  picture  with  the  present  state  of  ^ 
things  in  our  Confederacy,  which  makes  you  assure  me 
4  that  the  feelings  of  the  people  of  Massachusetts  toward 
my  State  are  not  those  of  antagonism,'  —  I  gush  forth  in 
anguish  and  ask,  Why  a  necessity  for  such  assurance? 
Why  any  antagonism  between  these,  the  devoted  States  of 
Hancock  and  Washington  ?  May  God  in  his  mercy  and 
in  love  guide  them  as  of  yore  !  May  they  ever  be  cemented 


232  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

in  union  by  the  blood  of  the  revolution !  And  whenever 
another  night  of  gloom  and  trial  shall  come,  may  they  hail 
and  cheer  each  other  on  again  to  victory,  for  civil  and  re 
ligious  liberty.  „  Yours  truly, 

"HENRY  A.  WISE." 

Wise  had  approved  the  passage  of  the  Kansas-Nebraska 
bill,  which  repealed  the  Missouri  Compromise,  the  first  act, 
in  his  opinion,  to  violate  Washington's  injunction  not  to 
recognize  geographical  lines,  and  which  had  made  a  border 
between  the  North  and  South  and  begun  a  separation  of 
the  States.  In  a  letter  to  a  Democratic  meeting  in  New 
York,  he  wrote  from  Accomack  on  this  subject,  under 
date  of  October  18,  1855 :  - 

"  The  Constitution,  and  not  any  temporary  and  temporiz 
ing  compromise  statute,  is  the  true  and  only  standard  of  na 
tional  right.  The  Constitution,  in  its  strict  sense,  and  not 
according  to  the  latitudinarian  construction  of  a  loose  Fed 
eral  majority ;  the  Constitution,  which  leaves  all  powers  not 
expressly  granted  where  it  found  them,  the  reserved  rights 
of  the  sovereign  States ;  the  Constitution,  which  created  cer 
tain  Federal  relations  and  rights  of  private  citizens,  among 
the  most  important  of  which  is  perfect  equality  between 
citizens  of  the  respective  States  on  the  common  grounds 
of  Federal  jurisdiction ;  perfect  comity  between  the  citizens 
of  State  and  States,  and  common  property  between  them 

^jin  the  national  domain  and  dominion ;  the  Constitution  is 
Sthe  law  of  our  Confederacy.     It  is  no  respecter  of  persons  ; 

>  it  holds  all  alike,  and  equally  under  its  protecting  guar 
dianship  wherever  it  applies.  It  pries  not  into  your  private 
possession,  nor  into  mine.  It  knows  not  whether  you 
own  one  species  of  property,  or  I  another.  It  recognizes 
us  only  as  citizens  of  coequal  State  sovereignties,  who 
are  confederated  under  its  shield,  and  it  provides  protec- 


THE   CONSTITUTION   THE   ONLY   STANDARD  233 

tion  for  whatever  right  belongs  to  either  of  us  on  ground 
which  belongs  to  both.  The  mere  municipal  authority, 
the  Congress,  cannot  deprive  States  and  their  citizens  of 
this  equality,  this  comity,  and  this  common  property  of  the 
Confederacy. 

"  If  you  may  go  to  the  common  Territory  with  what  is 
rightfully  yours  in  New  York,  I  may  meet  you  there  with 
whatever  is  lawfully  mine  in  Virginia.  Congress  may  not 
say  that  I  shall  not  migrate  with  slave  property  and  hold 
it  there ;  for  if  they  may  say  that,  they  may,  in  like  man 
ner,  say  that  you  shall  not  go  there  with  horses  and  house 
hold  goods  and  hold  them ;  and  if  they  may  declare 
against  the  right  of  either,  they  may  invade  inalienable 
rights  and  enact  laws  not  within  the  competency  of  legis 
lation. 

"  The  sovereign  act  of  defining  what  shall  and  what 
shall  not  be  tenable  property  by  the  citizen  can  be  deter 
mined  only  by  the  conventional  power  of  the  people,  form 
ing  organic  law  —  a  Constitution  changing  a  Territory 
into  a  State.  Until  the  new  State  comes  into  being,  no 
power  upon  earth  can  lawfully  deprive  you  of  your  horses 
and  household  goods,  or  me  of  my  slave,  in  Kansas,  unless 
the  private  property  be  taken  for  public  use  with  just  com 
pensation.  And,  gentlemen,  you  say  truly, 4  that  the  peace 
and  quiet  of  the  country  demand  that  it  should  be  left  to 
the  people  of  the  Territories  to  determine  for  themselves,' 
what  their  constitution  of  government  shall  be,  not  only 
in  respect  to  slavery,  but  every  other  local  question.  The- 
public  peace  is  endangered  by  this  '  disturbing  subject.'  ' 
It  is  a  practical  question  of  right  and  threatens  to  be  one 
of  force.  Force  has  already  been  exerted  '  on  the  border,' 
and  in  the  face  of  this  danger  there  is  an  organized  4  Fu 
sion,'  which  must,  if  persisted  in,  compel  a  resort  to  arms 
in  order  to  resist  evil  spirits,  combined  to  repeal  the 


234  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

'Kansas-Nebraska    bill,  and  to  reestablish   the   Missouri 
Prohibition.' 

"Prior  to  1819-20,  the  Constitution  reigned  supreme 
on  this  subject.  It  was  then  invaded  by  a  repealable,  par 
tial,  sectional  statute,  called  the  Missouri  Compromise. 
It  was  the  first  separation  of  the  States ;  it  first  sectioned 
the  country  like  a  survey  of  the  public  lands ;  it  first  said 
to  the  people  the  dividing  language  of  Lot  and  Abraham 

—  to  some  '  go  North '  to  some  '  go  South ' ;  it  was  the 
first  line  which  divided  North  from  South,  more  in  feeling 
than  in  fact.     Did  it  not  make  a  geographical  demarkation 

—  a  line  of  latitude,  —  the  boundary  of  legal  limitations  and 
determine  that  what  was  constitutional  on  one  side  of  it, 
should  be  unconstitutional  on  the  other  side  of  it?     No, 
said  its  friends  at  the  time  of  its  passage,  it  leaves  slavery 
to  be  governed  by  the  law  of  climate.     It  is  a  climatory, 
not  a  territorial  or  sectional  line.     It  means  to  '  follow 
nature,'  to  let  Jack  Frost  be  king  of  the  subject;  as  slavery 
was  profitable  south,  and  as  frost  pinched  negroes'  toes  and 
fingers  too  sharp  north  of  36.30  for  it  to  be  profitable  there, 
the  question  never  should  be  raised  con-slavery  south,  nor 
pro-slavery  north  of  that  line  of  latitude.     Well,  admitting 
this  to  be  a  more  consistent  and  rational  construction  of 
the  '  agreement  to  disagree,'  did  the  '  fanatics  of  fusion ' 
so  abide  it  ?     Never !     In  every  phase  of  the  Compromise, 

^first  and  last,  they  have  broken  its  letter  and  spirit.  In- 
~:e€ssantly  they  have  raised  the  question  con-slavery  South 
and  North,  East  and  West,  everywhere.  In  the  States  and 
Territories  and  District,  in  the  Indian  country,  on  the  train 
in  transitu  between  States,  Districts,  and  Territories,  on  the 
acquisition  of  territory,  on  the  organization  and  admission 
of  States  into  the  Union,  on  questions  of  peace  and  war, 
ever,  everywhere,  always,  in  season  and  out  of  season,  they 
have  raised  the  question  against  slavery,  until  they  have, 


THE   MISSOURI    COMPROMISE  235 

on  various  occasions,  nearly  raised  the  very  demon  of  civil 
war  and  disunion  !  They  have  harbored  English  emissa 
ries  ;  raised  foreign  funds ;  wielded  associated  influence 
and  capital ;  wearied  Congress  with  petitions ;  fatigued 
the  public  mind  with  compromises ;  filled  it  with  revil 
ing  and  abuse ;  pensioned  press,  pulpit,  preacher,  teacher ; 
run  underground  railroads ;  spirited  away  runaways ;  have 
scattered  broadcast  tales  of  holy  horrors ;  painted  on  the 
stage  scenes;  written  log-cabin  novels;  lectured,  ranted, 
rioted,  until  they  have  made  us  a  divided  people,  until 
they  have  cut  the  continent  in  two  by  a  line  of  border 
feuds;  until  they  have  separated  our  churches;  set  us 
apart  socially,  at  the  watering  and  other  places,  and  until 
they  have  engendered  a  sectional  antagonism  more  becom 
ing  enemies  in  hostile  array  than  tolerant  neighbors  even, 
much  less  'united  brethren'  —  children  of  one  father  — 
children  of  a  common  country,  the  only  children  the 
Father  of  that  country  ever  had,  whose  farewell  is  still 
our  warning ! 

"  Within  the  year  I  have  stood  on  the  rock  of  Point 
Pleasant  overlooking  the  grave  of  Cornstalk,  the  battle 
ground  between  the  Indian  and  the  Long  Knife,  fattened 
by  the  blood  of  the  conquest,  whereby  Virginia  secured 
the  eminent  domain  of  the  whole  Northwest  Territory. 
There  before  me  spread  out  that  vast  domain,  now  a  giant 
group  of  civilized  sovereignties,  empire  of  power,  a  com 
pact  tier  of  free  States !  Who  made  them  free  States:?1  ] 
Their  mother  slave  State.  Virginia,  by  her  deed  of  ces 
sion,  on  her  own  conditions,  with  a  liberality  large  as 
love  of  continental  country,  made  Ohio  and  her  sisters  of 
the  Northwest  Territory  free  States.  Hers  was  no  Wil- 
mot  Proviso.  It  was  a  whole  and  entire  grant  to  free 
dom,  the  first  ever  made  upon  earth  like  it,  and  made 
before  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  was  formed. 


236  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY    A.  WISE 

After  'a  more  perfect  Union'  was  formed,  a  permanent, 
uniform,  universal,  organic  law  began  to  reign.  It  left 
the  domestic  institutions  with  the  States.  It  defines  the 
only  cases  where  the  Federal  authority  can  intervene. 
One  of  the  cases  is  that  of  a  slave  flying  from  one  State  to 
another,  he  shall  be  restored  to  his  master.  By  a  double 
tier  of  laws,  Federal  and  State,  by  constitutional  and  by 
statute  laws,  the  master  may  reclaim  him.  And  yet, 
gentlemen,  though  thus  fortified  by  laws,  organic  and  leg 
islative,  State  and  Federal,  I  might  as  well  have  a  thou 
sand  dollars  floating  on  a  chip  in  the  Ohio  River,  as  to 
own  a  slave  worth  that  sum  on  the  Virginia  shores  of  that 
river !  What  then  ?  The  laws  do  not  reign !  The  very 
free  soil  which  Virginia  first  consecrated  on  the  conti 
nent  is  made  the  underground  for  the  railroads  of  her 
runaways ! " 

Although  he  had  long  been  a  supporter  of  Mr.  Buchanan 
and  an  extreme  antagonist  of  the  antislavery  party,  Wise 
was  strongly  opposed  to  the  admission  of  Kansas  under 
the  Lecompton  Constitution,  which,  while  it  had  declared 
in  favor  of  slavery,  had  failed  to  submit  that  instrument 
to  a  vote  of  the  people.  In  a  letter  replying  to  an  invita 
tion  to  address  a  meeting  of  Anti-Lecompton  Democrats, 
in  Philadelphia,  Wise  wrote  under  the  date  of  February 
6,  1858 :  - 

'H>"  And  why  impose  this  Constitution  of  a  minority  on  a 
majority?  Cui  bono?  Does  any  Southern  man  imagine 
that  this  is  a  practicable  or  sufferable  way  of  making  a 
"'slave  State?  Who  believes  now  that  Kansas  will  be  made 
"a  slave  State,  or  kept  one  for  any  time,  by  the  admission 
of  this  Constitution  ?  Who  will  carry  a  slave  there  now 
to  become  a  bone  of  contention  in  a  border  war?  The 
sport  of  violence  and  fraud  and  force  like  that  which  has 
so  long  endangered  person  and  property  and  political  fran- 


THE   LECOMPTON    CONSTITUTION  237 

chise,  in  that  unhappy  battle-ground  of  sectional  feuds? 
To  what  end  is  this  to  be  done,  if  speedily  it  is  to  be  un 
done  with  State  authority,  created  to  drive  slave  property 
from  the  Territory? 

"  We  have  proudly,  heretofore,  contended  only  for 
equality  and  justice ;  but  if  this  be  wantonly  done  with 
out  winning  a  stake  —  the  power  of  a  slave  State  thereby 
—  it  will  be  worse  than  vain.  It  will  be  snatching  power 
per  fas  aut  nefas,  to  be  lost  c  speedily '  with  the  loss  of 
something  of  far  more  worth  than  political  votes  —  our 
moral  prestige.  If  we  are  not  willing  to  do  justice,  we 
can't  ask  for  justice;  if  we  can't  agree  to  equality,  we 
must  expect  to  be  denied  it.  It  is  our  bull  goring  the 
antislavery  ox.  Suppose  we  had  had  a  majority  of  slave 
holders  in  that  Territory ;  suppose  a  minority  of  abolition 
ists  had  gotten  the  census  and  registry  into  their  hands 
and  had  kept  fifteen  out  of  thirty-four  counties  out  of  the 
convention ;  suppose  they  had  formed  a  Constitution  with 
a  clause  prohibiting  slavery,  and  had  sent  it  to  Congress 
without  submitting  it  to  a  majority  of  the  legal  voters  ; 
or  suppose  they  had  submitted  all  parts  of  the  Constitu 
tion  to  the  popular  vote,  except  the  one  clause  prohibiting 
slavery,  knowing  it  would  be  voted  down  if  submitted  to 
the  majority  of  the  people  ;  suppose  such  a  '  boot  on  the 
other  leg '  had  been  submitted  to  Congress,  and  we  had  then 
heard  the  absoluteness  of  a  convention  contended  for  by 
Black  Republicans,  demanding  of  Congress  to  sustain  th.j 
doctrine  of  '  legitimacy.'  I  tell  you  that  every  Southern 
man  would  have  been  in  arms  and  would  have  been  roused 
to  the  shedding  of  blood,  rather  than  submit  to  Congress^ 
fastening  upon  a  majority  of  pro-slavery  people  an  arbi 
trary  rescript  of  a  mere  convention,  unauthorized  to 
proclaim  its  Constitution  without  an  express  grant.  This 
is  the  same  principle,  accompanied  by  trickery  and  fraud. 


238  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

We  are  willing  'to  do  unto  others  as  we  would  have 
them  do  unto  us.'  The  Southern  people  ask  for  no 
injustice,  no  inequality. 

"  We  are  told  that  4  prompt  admission '  of  Kansas  as  a 
State  will  end  the  agitation  in  Congress  and  localize  it  in 
Kansas.  What  is  the  Kansas  question  ?  Is  it  local  to 
Kansas  ?  No.  It  never  can  be  local  again.  It  has  per 
vaded  all  places  and  all  classes  in  our  country.  Let  Con 
gress  indorse  this  schedule  of  legerdemain,  let  the  South 
insist  on  it,  let  the  Northern  Democracy  be  required  to 
consent  to  the  injustice,  and  the  precedent  becomes  of 
universal  application  and  citation  against  us  for  all  time. 
Not  only  will  the  example  plead,  but  it  will  be  a  plea  in 
continuous  cases  of  similar  import  and  danger,  rising  suc 
cessively  as  long  as  our  vast  Territories  to  the  Pacific 
shall  be  filling  up.  It  comes  up  again  and  again,  every 
year,  from  Territories  extending  from  Mesilla  Valley  to 
Dacotah.  Flatter  not  ourselves,  then,  that  any  mode  of 
adjustment  will  do  because  it  is  the  'speediest'  for 
Kansas.  It  is  all-essential  that  the  settlement  shall  be 
just  and  right  and  equal.  If  not,  it  is  sure  to  be  mis 
chievous  to  that  party  which  has  snatched  power  with 
out  right  and  done  wrong  that  good  may  come  of  it. 
To  do  justice  is  always  the  best  policy.  If  all  would 
^'demand  only  what  is  right  and  submit  to  nothing  that 

wrong,'  injustice  and  oppression  could  never  be  perpe- 
or  tolerated. 

'**  The  ulterior  effects  of  adopting  the  Lecompton  Con- 
ution,  with  its  schedule  annexed,  will  be  worse  than 

ferring  back  the  question  to  the  territorial  decision. 
It  will  arraign  this  administration  and  the  Democracy  and 
the  South,  for  demanding  more  than  its  right  and  for 
forcing  resistance  to  wrong.  It  will  be  jagging  the  lion 
of  a  majority  whilst  the  hand  of  a  minority  is  in  its 


THE   EFFECTS    OF   THE   ADOPTION  239 

mouth.  It  will  return  the  chalice  to  our  own  lips,  when 
the  Kansas  question  again  and  again  arises  in  North 
Texas,  in  New  Mexico,  in  Mesilla  Valley,  and  in  all  our 
boundless  domain  of  unsettled  and  fast-settling  territory. 
It  will  drive  from  us  thousands  of  honest  Democrats  in  the 
North,  who  can  willingly  stand  by  us  for  justice  and 
equality,  but  who  must  leave  us  when  we  demand  more 
and  refuse  justice  and  equality  to  others.  It  will  raise 
the  Black  Republican  flag  over  the  Capitol  in  the  next 
struggle  for  power,  and  that,  then,  will  raise  the  last  dread 
issue  of  union  or  disunion!  Are  not  some  aiming  to 
drive  us  to  such  extremities  as  will  raise  that  issue  past 
being  laid?" 


k 


CHAPTER  XIV 

THE  JOHN  BROWN  INVASION.  HIS  TRIAL  AND  EXECUTION. 
WISE'S  DESCRIPTION  OF  HIM,  AND  MESSAGE  TO  THE  LEGIS 
LATURE.  THE  REPORT  OF  THE  LEGISLATIVE  COMMITTEE. 
UNVEILING  OF  THE  WASHINGTON  MONUMENT  AT  RICHMOND 

ALTHOUGH  the  bitter  sectional  conflict,  which  raged  at 
this  period  over  the  slavery  issue,  boded  ill  for  the  future 
peace  of  the  country,  yet  no  people  were  ever  more  com 
pletely  taken  by  surprise  than  were  the  peaceful  inhabit 
ants  of  the  Shenandoah  Valley  in  Virginia,  when  the  news 
spread  abroad  on  an  October  day,  in  the  year  1859,  that  the 
United  States  arsenal  and  armory  at  Harper's  Ferry  had 
been  seized  by  a  band  of  insurrectionists,  who  held  the 
town  in  defiance  of  the  legally  constituted  authorities  and 
were  shooting  down  unoffending  citizens  in  cold  blood. 

John  Brown,  who  had  long  contemplated  an  attack  on 
the  institution  of  slavery  in  Virginia,  entertained  the  be 
lief  that  some  mountain  fastness  in  the  Appalachian  range 
would  be  the  proper  stronghold  from  which  to  begin  his 
Ian  of  emancipation.  The  career  of  Brown  in  Kansas 
as  been  so  often  treated  by  various  writers  in  describing 
e  border  warfare  that  existed  in  that  Territory,  that  it 
would  be  idle,  as  well  as  foreign  to  our  purpose,  to  treat 
of  it  here.  Suffice  it  to  say,  that  in  regard  to  the  much- 
discussed  Pottawatomie  massacre,  it  is  now  admitted  by 
Brown's  admirers  that  he  took  an  active  part  in  that 
bloody  affair.  On  the  night  of  May  24, 1856,  a  Mr.  Doyle 
and  his  two  sons,  who  resided  at  Pottawatomie,  were  taken 

240 


THE   JOHN   BROWN   INVASION  241 

from  their  beds,  whereupon  the  father  was  shot  dead  by 
Brown,  and  the  two  younger  Doyles  stabbed  and  hacked  to 
death  with  swords  in  the  hands  of  the  sons  of  Brown.  A 
man  named  Wilkinson  was  dragged  from  the  bedside  of  his 
sick  wife,  carried  out  and  killed,  close  enough  to  the  house 
for  his  wife  to  hear  the  struggle  and  final  shot;  and  a 
farmer  named  John  Sherman  underwent  a  similar  fate. 
The  champions  of  Brown  find  their  justification  for  his  acts 
in  the  character  of  the  times,  and  the  alleged  necessity  of 
retaliatory  measures,  on  the  part  of  the  free-state  men, 
who  resided  in  Kansas  at  that  period.  It  is  customary, 
however,  to  credit  Brown  with  the  sympathy  and  aid  of 
the  antislavery  leaders  who  migrated  to  Kansas,  yet  the 
recently  published  works  of  such  men  as  Governor  Charles 
Robinson,  Eli  Thayer,  and  Amos  A.  Lawrence  go  to  show 
that  the  methods  employed  and  the  ends  sought  by  Brown 
were,  in  many  respects,  diametrically  opposed  to  those  pur 
sued  by  the  more  conservative  free-state  men.  Robinson 
and  Thayer,  the  two  men  whose  work  in  Kansas  had  done 
most  to  insure  the  admission  of  that  Territory  as  a  free 
State,  had  throughout  counselled  obedience  to  the  laws 
and  respect  for  constituted  authority.  They  waged  a  stub 
born  contest,  it  is  true,  and  were  prepared  to  meet  force 
with  force,  but  to  their  credit  be  it  said,  they  sought  to 
act  within  the  pale  of  the  law  and  by  peaceful  methods. 
The  Hon.  Amos  A.  Lawrence  of  Massachusetts,  to  whose 
business  knowledge  and  zeal  the  Emigrant  Aid  Society 
was  indebted  for  the  large  amount  of  capital  necessary  to 
the  conduct  of  their  undertaking,  furnished  Brown  with 
the  money  to  go  west  in  1855,  and  further  aided  him  by 
paying  off  a  mortgage  on  the  latter's  farm,  located  in 
the  wilds  of  the  Adirondacks.  In  an  address  delivered 
before  the  Massachusetts  Historical  Society  in  May, 
1884,  Mr.  Lawrence  said:  "It  fell  to  me  to  give  John 


242  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

Brown  his  first  letter  to  Kansas,  introducing  him  to  Gov 
ernor  Robinson  and  authorizing  him  to  employ  him  and 
draw  on  me  for  his  compensation,  if  he  could  make  him 
useful  in  the  work  of  the  Emigrant  Aid  Society.  But 
very  soon  Governor  Robinson  wrote  that  he  could  not 
employ  him,  as  he  was  unreliable,  and  '  would  as  soon  shoot 
a  United  States  officer  as  a  Border  ruffian.' 

"  When  he  was  a  prisoner  at  Harper's  Ferry,  I  wrote  to 
Governor  Wise,  advising  his  release  on  the  ground  that  he 
was  a  monomaniac  and  that  his  executio*n  would  make  him 
a  martyr.  The  answer  to  this  letter  was  very  creditable  to 
Governor  Wise.  Afterward,  when  in  Washington  about 
the  Kansas  troubles,  I  spoke  of  it  to  Mr.  Pierce,  the  ex- 
President,  who  was  there  at  the  time,  and  he  asked  to  see 
it.  So  I  ordered  it  sent  to  him ;  but  it  was  never  returned. 

"John  Brown  had  no  enemies  in  New  England,  but 
many  friends  and  admirers.  He  was  constantly  receiving 
money  from  them.  They  little  knew  what  use  he  was 
making  of  it,  for  he  deceived  everybody." 

Of  a  similar  character  is  the  description  of  Brown's  Kan 
sas  career,  given  by  Governor  Robinson  in  his  interesting 
work  entitled  the  "  Kansas  Conflict,"  and  by  Eli  Thayer,  in 
his  not  less  valuable  contribution  to  American  history,  the 
"  Kansas  Crusade."  The  latter  has  applied  to  him  Moore's 
description  of  Al  Hassan :  — 

"  One  of  that  saintly,  murderous  brood, 
To  carnage  and  the  Koran  given, 
Who  thinks  through  unbelievers'  blood, 
Lies  their  directest  path  to  heaven; 
One  who  will  pause  and  kneel,  unshod, 
In  the  warm  blood  his  hand  hath  poured, 
To  mutter  o'er  some  text  of  God 
Engraven  on  his  reeking  sword." 

"  John  Brown,"  writes  Thayer  in  his  "  Kansas  Crusade," 
"arrived  in  Kansas  nearly  two  years  after  the  conflict 


THE  JOHN  BROWN   INVASION  243 

there  against  slavery  began.  He  was  a  great  injury  to  the 
free-state  cause  and  to  the  free-state  settlers.  He  said, 
4 1  have  not  come  to  make  Kansas  free,  but  to  get  a  shot 
at  the  South.'  He  wished  to  begin  a  civil  war.  He  was 
the  pupil  of  the  Garrisonites  and  afterward  their  God." 

It  is  unnecessary  to  repeat  again  the  oft-told  story  of 
how  John  Brown,  after  carefully  planning  his  Virginia 
raid,  with  the  counsel  of  friends  gathered  at  Chatham, 
Canada,  rented  the  Kennedy  farm,  located  a  few  miles 
from  Harper's  Ferry,  on  the  Maryland  side  of  the  Poto 
mac  ;  and  how  for  a  few  months  preceding  his  attack  he 
occupied  himself  and  his  lieutenants  in  collecting  arms, 
ammunition,  and  stores  of  all  sorts,  and  in  familiarizing 
himself  with  the  inhabitants  and  general  character  of  the 
country  about  him. 

On  the  night  of  Sunday,  October  16, 1859,  Brown  set  out 
with  a  party  of  twenty-two  men,  all  armed,  for  Harper's 
Ferry,  located  on  the  Virginia  side  of  the  Potomac,  at 
the  confluence  of  the  Shenandoah  River  with  the  former. 

Although  the  idea  has  long  prevailed  that  Brown's 
party  consisted  of  only  twenty-two  men,  yet  there  is  good 
reason  to  believe  that  his  followers  exceeded  this  number 
and  that,  through  some  miscalculation  in  the  plan  of  the 
attack,  the  remainder  of  his  men  were  prevented  from 
uniting  with  him  at  the  proper  time.  On  the  day  follow 
ing  the  seizure  of  the  armory  and  arsenal,  Brown  informed 
several  of  his  prisoners  that  before  noon  on  that  day  he 
expected  large  reinforcements,  and  this  expression  was 
not  understood  as  applying  solely  to  the  slaves  whom  he 
expected  to  come  to  his  support.  In  the  opinion  of  Mr. 
Andrew  Hunter  of  Charlestown,  who  acted  as  the  prose 
cuting  attorney  during  the  trial  of  Brown,  the  arrival  of 
his  expected  reinforcements  was  prevented  by  the  prompt 
action  of  a  volunteer  company  from  Charlestown,  which, 


244  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY    A.  WISE 

at  an  early  hour  on  Monday  morning,  marched  to  a  point 
on  the  Potomac  above  Harper's  Ferry,  where  they  crossed 
the  river  and  proceeded  down  the  tow-path  to  the  mouth 
of  the  bridge,  thus  preventing  Brown's  escape,  or  assist 
ance  reaching  him  from  the  direction  of  the  Kennedy 
farm.  This  view  is  confirmed  by  the  fact  that  Brown  and 
Stevens,  seeing  the  approach  of  the  volunteers  along  the 
tow-path,  mistook  them  for  friends,  and  started  out  to 
meet  them,  which  resulted  in  the  latter's  being  shot. 

Throughout  Monday  Brown  had  held  possession  of  the 
town  and  continued  his  bloody  work  unabated ;  directing 
the  movements  of  his  men,  wearing  the  sword  Frederick 
the  Great  is  said  to  have  sent  to  Washington,  and  which 
had  been  captured  at  the  farm  of  Colonel  Lewis  Washing 
ton,  a  few  miles  distant  from  the  Ferry,  who  had  been  taken 
prisoner  by  Brown.  Two  significant  facts  had  thus  far 
characterized  the  fury  of  the  Kansas  leader,  the  first  man 
shot  by  Brown's  men  had  been  an  innocent,  unoffending 
negro  and,  contrary  to  the  cherished  expectation  of  Brown, 
no  slave  had  joined  in  his  attempted  insurrection,  except 
one  or  two  whom  he  had  captured  and  who  had  accom 
panied  him  under  compulsion.  Despite  his  previous  visits 
to  Virginia  for  the  purpose  of  familiarizing  himself  with 
the  conditions  and  habits  of  the  slaves,  Brown  had  shown 
himself  a  less  penetrating  judge  of  their  character  than 
Frederick  Douglass,  himself  an  ex-slave,  and  who  had 
warned  the  former  that  he  need  not  look  for  assistance 
from  that  element  of  the  population. 

It  is  a  fact  of  general  knowledge  that  on  Tuesday  morn 
ing  a  body  of  United  States  marines,  who  had  been  ordered 
to  Harper's  Ferry  and  were  commanded  by  Colonel  Robert 
E.  Lee,  battered  down  the  doors  of  the  engine  house  and 
captured  the  remainder  of  Brown's  party,  along  with  their 
chief.  Rumors  of  the  outbreak  had  reached  Richmond  on 


THE  JOHN   BROWN   INVASION  245 

Monday  morning,  and  orders  were  immediately  issued  by 
telegraph  by  Wise  to  the  militia  of  Jefferson  County  to 
hold  themselves  in  readiness.  About  seven  o'clock  that 
evening,  news  of  a  far  more  alarming  character  was  re 
ceived,  and  the  wires  brought  the  intelligence  that  a  large 
number  of  marauders  had  seized  the  arsenal  at  Harper's 
Ferry,  with  all  its  arms  and  ammunitions  and  were  proceed 
ing  to  arm  the  slaves  and  endeavoring  to  incite  them  to 
the  murder  of  the  whites. 

On  an  hour's  notice,  the  First  Virginia  Regiment,  ac 
companied  by  the  governor,  set  out  for  Harper's  Ferry 
and  were  joined  at  Washington  by  another  force  from 
Alexandria.  Owing  to  delays  at  Washington  and  at  the 
Eelay  House,  Wise  did  not  arrive  with  the  volunteers 
until  one  o'clock  P.M.  on  Tuesday,  after  the  insurgents' 
had  been  captured.  In  a  message  subsequently  addressed 
to  the  legislature,  he  wrote :  "  I  immediately  examined 
the  leader,  Brown,  his  lieutenant,  Stevens,  a  white  man 
named  Coppie,  and  a  negro  from  Canada.  They  made 
full  confessions.  Brown  repelled  the  idea  that  his  design 
was  to  run  negro  slaves  off  from  their  masters.  He  de 
fiantly  avowed  that  his  purpose  was  to  arm  them  and 
make  them  fight  by  his  side  in  defence  of  their  freedom, 
if  assailed  by  their  owners  or  any  one  else ;  and  he  said  his 
purpose  especially  was  to  war  upon  the  slaveholders  and 
to  levy  upon  their  other  property  to  pay  the  expense  of 
emancipating  their  slaves.  He  avowed  that  he  expected 
to  be  joined  by  the  slaves  and  by  numerous  white  persons 
from  many  of  the  slave  as  well  as  the  free  States." 

As  Brown's  intention  to  incite  the  slaves  to  resistance 
was  denied  by  him  during  the  course  of  his  trial,  it  is 
worthy  of  note  that  his  attention  was  called  by  Mr. 
Andrew  Hunter  to  his  earlier  statements  made  to  the 
governor  and  himself,  which  Brown  attempted  to  explain 


246  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

by  saying  that  he  had  spoken  before  the  trial  without  prepa 
ration,  and  under  stress  of  the  excitement,  and  unintention 
ally  conveyed  a  wrong  impression.  After  his  conviction 
and  prior  to  his  execution,  Brown  addressed  a  note  to  Mr. 
Hunter,  published  in  the  newspapers  at  the  time,  in  which 
he  reaffirmed  his  first  statement  made  in  the  presence  of 
Hunter  and  Wise. 

So  much  has  been  written,  by  abolition  sympathizers,  of 
alleged  indignities  to  which  Brown  was  subjected  by  the 
Virginia  authorities,  that  we  may  be  pardoned  for  quoting 
Von  Hoist,  one  of  Brown's  most  ardent  admirers,  as  well 
as  one  of  Wise's  severest  critics.  In  alluding  to  the  inter 
view  of  Senator  Mason  and  Wise  with  Brown,  that  author 
writes :  "  In  contrast  with  so  many  Northern  journalists, 
and  to  some  extent  with  Vallandingham,  the  two  Virgin 
ians  proved  themselves  perfect  gentlemen  on  this  occa 
sion.  Neither  the  subject-matter  nor  the  manner  of  their 
questions  could  either  irritate  or  insult  the  prisoner,  who 
was  severely  wounded  and  suffering  violent  pain."  1 

In  giving  his  impressions  of  Brown  in  an  impromptu 
address  to  the  Virginia  militia  on  his  return  to  Richmond, 
Wise  said :  "  They  are  themselves  mistaken  who  take  him 
to  be  a  madman.  He  is  a  bundle  of  the  best  nerves  I 
ever  saw  cut  and  thrust  and  bleeding  and  in  bonds.  He 
is  a  man  of  clear  head,  of  courage,  fortitude,  and  simple 
ingenuousness.  He  is  cool,  collected,  and  indomitable ; 

1  It  was  the  above  circumstance  that  furnished  the  basis  for  the  follow 
ing  extract  from  Emerson's  lecture  on  "Courage"  :  "The  true  temper 
has  genial  influences.  It  makes  a  bond  of  union  between  enemies.  Gov 
ernor  Wise  of  Virginia,  in  the  record  of  his  first  interview  with  his 
prisoner,  appeared  to  great  advantage.  If  Governor  Wise  is  a  superior 
man,  or  inasmuch  as  he  is  a  superior  man,  he  distinguishes  John  Brown. 
As  they  confer,  they  understand  each  other  swiftly  ;  each  respects  the 
other.  If  opportunity  allowed,  they  would  prefer  each  other's  society 
and  desert  their  former  companions.  Enemies  would  become  affec 
tionate." 


THE  CHARACTER   OF   JOHN   BROWN  247 

and  it  is  but  just  to  him  to  say  that  he  was  humane  to  his 
prisoners,  as  attested  to  me  by  Colonel  Washington  and 
Mr.  Mills,  and  he  inspired  me  with  great  trust  in  his 
integrity  as  a  man  of  truth.  He  is  a  fanatic,  vain  and 
garrulous;  but  firm,  truthful,  and  intelligent.  His  men, 
too,  who  survive,  except  the  free  negroes  with  him,  are 
like  him.  He  professes  to  be  a  Christian,  in  communion  , 
with  the  Congregationalist  Church  of  the  North,  and  openly 
preaches  his  purpose  of  universal  emancipation,  and  the 
negroes  themselves  were  to  be  the  agents,  by  means  of 
arms,  led  on  by  white  commanders.  .  .  .  And  Colonel 
Washington  says  that  he  [Brown]  'was  the  coolest  and 
firmest  man  he  ever  saw  in  defying  danger  and  death. 
With  one  son  dead  by  his  side,  and  another  shot  through, 
he  felt  the  pulse  of  his  dying  son  with  one  hand  and  held 
his  rifle  with  the  other  and  commanded  his  men  with  the 
utmost  composure,  encouraging  them  to  be  firm  and  to 
sell  their  lives  as  dearly  as  they  could.' " l 

lThe  Rev.  H.  Clay  Trumbull,  in  a  recent  book  entitled  "War 
Memories  of  a  Chaplain,"  relates  the  following  incident  in  connection 
with  General  Alfred  H.  Terry,  who  was  stationed  in  Richmond  as  mili 
tary  governor  of  Virginia  shortly  after  the  war :  "  On  one  occasion, 
General  Henry  A.  Wise,  governor  of  Virginia,  at  the  time  of  the  John 
Brown  raid,  came  into  the  office  to  apply  for  the  intervention  of  Gen 
eral  Terry  to  repossess  him  of  a  building  on  his  lands  in  the  eastern 
part  of  the  State.  In  the  course  of  the  conversation,  it  came  out  that 
that  building  was  now  occupied  as  a  school  for  little  negroes,  taught  by 
a  daughter  of  old  John  Brown,  whom  he  had  hanged.  The  disclosure  of 
this  fact  caused  a  friend  of  General  Wise,  who  was  present,  to  comment 
on  the  strange  turn  of  affairs  by  which,  within  six  years  from  the  execu 
tion  of  John  Brown,  the  governor  who  hanged  him  was  imploring  the 
help  of  the  United  States  government  to  drive  one  of  John  Brown's 
daughters  out  of  the  governor's  house,  where  she  was  teaching  little 
negroes.  To  the  surprise  of  all,  General  Wise  responded  earnestly: 
'  John  Brown  !  John  Brown  was  a  great  man,  sir.  John  Brown  was 
a  great  man ! '  Henry  A.  Wise  was  man  enough  to  realize  that  God's 
ways  of  working  seem  different  when  looked  back  upon  in  accomplished 
history,  and  when  seen  distortedly  coming  toward  us  through  the  mists 
of  personal  prejudices  and  fears.*' 


248  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

Brown  and  his  associates  had  been  committed  to  the 
jail  at  Charlestown,  and  at  the  October  term  of  the  Circuit 
Court  a  joint  indictment  was  found  by  the  grand  jury 
against  him,  along  with  Stevens,  Shields,  Green,  Coppie, 
and  Copeland.  The  indictment  contained  four  counts, 
viz. :  1st,  Treason ;  2d,  Inciting  slaves  to  insurrection  ; 
3d,  Murder ;  4th,  Murder  with  John  Copeland  as  acces 
sory.  Although,  when  first  brought  before  the  examining 
court  of  justices,  Brown  had  proclaimed  that  he  did  not 
want  a  trial,  yet  when  the  time  came  he  had  able 
counsel  to  defend  him,  who  urged  delay,  and  sought  to 
take  any  advantage  furnished  by  the  technicalities  of  the 
law.  At  the  conclusion  of  the  trial,  and  before  sentence 
was  pronounced,  Brown,  when  asked  if  he  had  anything 
to  say,  arose,  and  in  the  course  of  his  address  said:  "I 
feel  entirely  satisfied  with  the  treatment  I  have  received 
on  my  trial.  Considering  all  the  circumstances,  it  has 
been  more  generous  than  I  expected." 

On  the  19th  of  November,  a  petition  for  a  writ  of 
error  to  the  Circuit  Court  was  presented  to  the  Court  of 
Appeals  of  Virginia  by  Messrs.  Samuel  Chilton  and  Will 
iam  Green,  counsel  for  Brown.  The  reputation  of  these 
two  members  of  the  bar  is  in  itself  a  guarantee  that  no 
defect,  if  any,  in  the  record  was  lost  sight  of,  but  the  Ap 
pellate  Court,  which  consisted  at  the  time  of  Judges  John 
J.  Allen,  William  Daniel,  R.  C.  L.  Moncure,  George  Hay 
Lee,  and  William  J.  Robertson,  denied  the  petition  after 
a  careful  inspection  of  the  record  of  the  lower  court.  It 
has  been  so  often  charged,  by  the  sympathizers  of  Brown, 
that  his  trial  was  a  farce,  and  conducted  regardless  of  the 
forms  of  law,  that  it  is  worth  while  to  bear  in  mind  the 
high  character  and  reputation  of  the  judges  who  sat  upon 
the  supreme  bench  of  Virginia  at  that  time. 

That  Brown  was  not  only  humanely,  but  kindly  treated 


JOHN   BROWN   IN   PRISON  249 

during  the  period  of  imprisonment  at  Charlestown,  is  shown 
by  an  abundance  of  testimony,  the  statements  of  abolition 
fanatics  to  the  contrary  notwithstanding.  The  Hon.  An 
drew  Hunter,  the  prosecuting  attorney,  wrote :  "  My  in 
structions  from  Governor  Wise  were  to  see  that  every 
comfort  and  privilege  consistent  with  their  condition  as 
prisoners  should  be  afforded  them.  This  was  religiously 
done,  and  the  charge  to  the  contrary  is  utterly  false.  Over 
and  over  again,  in  accordance  with  my  instructions  from 
Wise,  I  told  him  [Brown]  that  anything  he  wanted,  con 
sistent  with  his  condition  as  a  prisoner,  he  should  have." 
The  jailer  of  Jefferson  County  at  the  time,  a  man  named 
Avis,  was  repeatedly  thanked  by  Brown  for  his  many  acts 
of  kindness  to  him,  and  the  latter,  in  his  will,  further  re 
membered  Avis  by  leaving  him  his  Sharp's  rifle  and  pistol. 
In  a  letter  to  the  Hon.  Henry  Wilson  of  Massachusetts, 
dated  November  the  15th,  1873,  Wise  wrote  on  this  sub 
ject:  "I  required  him  to  be  treated  with  the  utmost  human 
ity  ;  but,  after  an  attempt  of  one  of  the  prisoners  to  escape, 
he  was  very  strictly  guarded,  and  no  one  was  allowed  to 
have  an  interview  with  him,  except  under  the  eye  of  the 
guard.  His  guard  had  his  instructions  under  General 
Willaim  B.  Taliaferro,  as  humane  and  refined  a  gentle 
man  as  ever  had  command  of  men  and  custody  of  prison 
ers.  His  wife  had  special  leave  to  visit  him,  and,  by  my 
orders,  was  escorted  from  Harper's  Ferry  to  Charlestown 
by  a  mounted  guard  of  cavalry,  to  protect  her  from  any 
indelicacy  of  treatment,  much  more  against  any  insult. 
No  insult  to  her  was  attempted,  and  to  make  sure  of  proper 
treatment  to  her  in  the  interview  with  her  husband,  Gen 
eral  Taliaferro  in  person  stood  sentinel  with  the  guard, 
and  kept  every  one  at  respectful  distance.  I  visited  John 
Brown  but  once  after  his  incarceration  to  await  his  trial. 
I  especially  desired  to  ascertain  whether  he  had  any  com- 


250  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

munication  to  make  to  me  other  than  he  had  already  made. 
He  repeated  mostly  the  same  information,  expressed  his 
personal  regard  and  respect  for  me,  thanked  me  for  my 
kindness  in  protecting  him  from  all  violence  and  in  pro 
viding  for  his  comfort.  He  complained  of  some  disease  of 
the  kidneys,  and  I  tendered  him  the  best  aid  of  physician 
and  surgeon,  which  he  declined,  for  the  reason  that  he 
was  accustomed  to  an  habitual  treatment,  which  he  had 
already  provided  for  himself.  He  talked  with  me  freely, 
and  I  offered  to  be  the  depositary  of  any  confidential  re 
quest  consistent  with  my  honor  and  duty ;  and  when  we 
parted  he  cordially  gave  me  his  blessing,  wishing  me  every 
return  for  the  attentions  to  him  as  a  prisoner.  This  was 
some  time  before  his  execution,  which  I  did  not  attend. 
In  my  opinion,  his  friends  are  mistaken  in  the  belief  that  he 
sat  up  the  most  of  the  night  before  his  execution  writing, 
etc.  There  was  no  need  of  that,  for  before  his  execution, 
after  the  date  of  his  arrest,  and  even  after  the  date  of  his 
conviction,  he  had  abundant  time  and  opportunity  to  write 
at  his  leisure  a  full  account  of  the  raid.  He  was  perfectly 
firm  and  composed,  except  when  touching  his  sorrows  for 
the  wrongs  done  to  his  sons  in  the  Kansas  wars.  Then  he 
was  at  times  bitter,  but  the  reports  to  me  were  that  he 
slept  well  and  quietly  all  the  time  of  his  imprisonment. 
He  was  especially  grateful  to  me  for  doing  all  I  could  to 
prevail  on  the  legislature  to  pardon  one  of  his  gang,  a 
youth  named  Coppie.  You  know  that  by  the  constitution 
of  Virginia  of  1850,  the  governor  could  pardon  in  all 
cases  except  treason." 

After  the  conviction  of  Brown,  letters  by  the  thousand 
poured  in  upon  Wise,  urging  his  pardon.  Many  of  these 
were  from  anonymous  writers,  threatening  in  their  tone, 
unless  their  demand  was  acceded  to  ;  others  were  from 
men  of  standing,  who,  while  admitting  the  justice  of  the 


THE   MESSAGE   TO   LEGISLATURE  251 

sentence,  deemed  it  ill  advised  to  hang  Brown,  as  it  would 
make  him,  in  popular  estimation,  a  "martyr."  In  his 
message  to  the  legislature,  which  did  not  assemble  until 
after  Brown's  execution,  but  prior  to  that  of  his  associates, 
Wise  wrote :  "  Sudden,  surprising,  shocking,  as  this  inva 
sion  has  been,  it  is  not  more  so  than  the  rapidity  and 
rancor  of  the  causes  which  have  prompted  and  put  it  in 
motion.  It  is  not  confined  to  the  parties  who  were  the 
present  participators  in  its  outrages.  Causes  and  influ 
ences  lie  behind  it  more  potent  far  than  the  little  band  of 
desperadoes  who  were  sent  ahead  to  kindle  the  sparks  of  a 
general  conflagration ;  and  the  event,  sad  as  it  is,  would 
deserve  but  little  comment,  if  the  condign  punishment  of 
the  immediate  perpetrators  of  the  felonies  committed 
would,  for  the  future,  secure  the  peace  which  has  been 
disturbed,  and  guarantee  the  safety  which  it  has  threat 
ened.  Indeed,  if  the  miserable  convicts  were  the  only 
conspirators  against  our  peace  and  safety,  we  might  have 
forgiven  their  offences  and  constrained  them  only  by  the 
grace  of  pardon.  But  an  entire  social  and  sectional  sym 
pathy  has  incited  their  crimes  and  now  rises  in  rebellion 
and  insurrection,  to  the  height  of  sustaining  and  justifying 
their  enormity.  .  .  .  The  strongest  argument  against 
this  unnatural  war,  upon  negro  slavery  in  one  section  by 
another  of  the  same  common  country,  is  that  it  inevitably 
drives  to  disunion  of  the  States,  embittered  with  all  the 
vengeful  hate  of  civil  war.  As  that  Union  is  among  the 
most  precious  of  our  blessings,  so  the  argument  ought  to 
weigh  which  weighs  its  value.  But  this  consideration  is 
despised  by  fanaticism.  It  contemns  the  Union  and  now 
contemns  us  for  clinging  to  it  as  we  do.  It  scoffs  the 
warning  that  the  Union  is  endangered.  The  Union  itself 
is  denounced,  as  a  covenant  with  sin,  and  we  are  scorned 
as  too  timid  to  make  the  warning  of  danger  to  it  worthy 


252  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY    A.  WISE 

to  be  heeded.  .  .  .  We  know  that  we  have  many  sound 
and  sincere  friends  in  the  non-slaveholding  States.  It  may 
be  that  they  are  most  numerous  far  who  abhor  and  detest 
such  wrongs  as  these ;  but  it  is  not  to  be  disguised  that 
the  conservative  elements  are  passive,  whilst  the  fanatical 
are  active,  and  the  former  are  fast  diminishing,  whilst  the 
latter  are  increasing  in  numbers  and  in  force.  But  where 
is  the  evidence  that  the  conservative  elements  are  the 
most  powerful  ?  .  .  .  Alas !  turn  where  we  will,  and  to 
what  we  will,  we  find  that  the  judgments  of  the  Courts 
only  are  with  us,  but  they  have  lost  all  reverence  and 
respect,  and  we  are  left  without  protection,  and  the 
Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States  is  itself  assailed  for 
not  assailing  our  constitutional  defences.  .  .  .  Though 
the  laws  do  not  permit  me  to  pardon  in  cases  of  treason, 
yet  pardons  and  reprieves  have  been  demanded  on  the 
grounds  of,  first,  insanity;  second,  magnanimity;  third, 
the  policy  of  not  making  martyrs.  As  to  the  first,  the 
parties  by  themselves  or  counsel  put  in  no  pleas  of  in 
sanity.  No  insanity  was  feigned  even ;  the  prisoner  Brown 
spurned  it.  Since  his  sentence,  and  since  the  decision  on 
the  appeal,  one  of  his  counsel,  Samuel  Chilton,  Esq.,  has 
filed  with  me  a  number  of  affidavits  professing  to  show 
ground  for  delaying  execution,  in  order  to  give  time  to  make 
an  issue  of  fact  as  to  the  sanity  of  the  prisoner.  How  such 
an  issue  can  now,  after  sentence  confirmed  by  the  Court 
of  Appeals,  be  made,  I  am  ignorant ;  but  it  is  sufficient  to 
say  that  I  had  repeatedly  seen  and  conversed  with  the 
prisoner,  and  had  just  returned  from  a  visit  to  him,  when 
this  appeal  to  me  was  put  into  my  hands.  As  well  as  I 
can  know  the  state  of  mind  of  any  one,  I  know  that  he 
was  sane  and  remarkably  sane,  if  quick  and  clear  percep 
tion,  if  assumed  rational  premises  and  consecutive  reason 
ing  from  them,  if  cautious  tact  in  avoiding  disclosures 


THE   MESSAGE   TO   LEGISLATURE  253 

and  in  covering  conclusions  and  inferences,  if  memory 
and  conception  and  practical  common-sense,  and  if  com 
posure  and  self-possession  are  evidence  of  a  sound  state  of 
naind.  He  was  more  sane  than  his  prompters  and  pro 
moters,  and  concealed  well  the  secret  which  made  him 
seem  to  do  an  act  of  mad  impulse,  by  leaving  him  without 
his  backers  at  Harper's  Ferry ;  but  he  did  not  conceal  his 
contempt  for  the  cowardice  which  did  not  back  him  better 
than  with  a  plea  of  insanity,  which  he  spurned  to  put  in  at 
his  trial  at  Charlestown.  As  to  the  second  ground  of 
appeal :  I  know  of  no  magnanimity  which  is  so  inhumane, 
and  no  inhumanity  could  well  exceed  that  to  our  society, 
our  slaves  as  well  as  their  masters,  which  would  turn 
felons  like  these,  proud  and  defiant  in  their  guilt,  loose 
again  on  a  border  already  torn  by  a  fanatical  and  sectional 
strife,  which  threatens  the  liberties  of  the  white  even 
more  than  it  does  the  bondage  of  the  black  race.  As  to 
the  third  ground:  Is  it  true  that  the  execution  of  our 
laws,  fairly  and  justly  administered  upon  these  confessed 
robbers,  murderers,  and  traitors,  will  make  them  martyrs 
in  the  public  sentiment  of  other  States  ?  If  so,  then  it  is 
time,  indeed,  that  execution  shall  be  done  upon  them,  and 
that  we  should  prepare  in  earnest  for  the  'irrepressible 
conflict '  with  that  sympathy  which,  in  demanding  for 
these  criminals  pardons  and  reprieves,  and  in  wreaking 
vengeance  for  their  refusal,  would  make  criminals  of  us. 
Indeed,  a  blasphemous  moral  treason,  an  expressed  fellow- 
feeling  with  felons,  a  professed  conservatism  of  crime,  a 
defiant  and  boastful  guilty  demoniac  spirit  combined, 
arraign  us,  the  outraged  community,  as  the  wrong-doers 
who  must  do  penance  and  prevent  our  penalty  by  pardon 
and  reprieve  of  these  martyrs.  This  sympathy  sent  these 
men  tools  to  do  the  deeds  which  sentenced  them.  It  may 
have  sent  them  to  be  martyrs  for  mischief's  sake  ;  but  the 


254  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

execution  of  our  laws  is  necessary  to  warn  future  victims 
not  again  to  be  its  tools.  To  heed  this  outside  clamor  at 
all  was  to  grant  at  once  unconditional  grace.  To  hang 
would  be  no  more  martyrdom  than  to  incarcerate  the 
fanatic.  The  sympathy  would  have  asked  on  and  on  for 
liberation,  and  to  nurse  and  soothe  him,  whilst  life  lasted, 
in  prison.  His  state  of  health  would  have  been  heralded 
weekly  as  from  a  palace,  visitors  would  have  come, 
affectedly  reverent,  to  see  the  shorn  felon  at  hard  labor, 
the  work  of  his  hands  would  have  been  sought  as  holy 
relics,  and  his  parti-colored  dress  would  have  become,  per 
haps,  a  uniform  for  the  next  band  of  marauders.  There 
was  no  middle  ground  of  mitigation.  To  pardon  or  re 
prieve  at  all  was  to  proclaim  a  licensed  impunity  to  the 
thousand  fanatics,  who  are  mad  only  in  the  guilt  and  folly 
of  setting  up  their  individual  supremacy  over  law,  life, 
property,  and  civil  liberty  itself.  This  sympathy  with  the 
leader  was  worse  than  the  invasion  itself.  The  appeal 
was:  it  is  policy  to  make  no  martyrs,  but  disarm  mur 
derers,  traitors,  robbers,  insurrectionists,  by  free  pardon 
for  wanton,  malicious,  unprovoked  felons !  I  could  but 
ask,  Will  execution  of  the  legal  sentence  of  a  human  law 
make  martyrs  of  such  criminals  ?  Do  sectional  and  social 
masses  hallow  these  crimes  ?  Do  whole  communities  sym 
pathize  with  the  outlaws,  instead  of  sympathizing  with  the 
outraged  society  of  a  sister  sovereignty  ?  If  so,  then  the 
sympathy  is  as  felonious  as  the  criminals,  and  is  far  more 
dangerous  than  was  the  invasion.  The  threat  of  martyr 
dom  is  a  threat  against  our  peace  and  demands  execution, 
to  defy  such  sympathy  and  such  saints  of  martyrdom." 

After  the  assembling  of  the  legislature  in  December, 
1859,  a  few  days  following  Brown's  execution,  various 
petitions  were  presented  to  that  body,  praying  that  the 
sentence  against  Stevens,  Coppie,  and  other  of  Brown's 


NEED   OF   TROOPS   AT   CHARLESTOWN  255 

associates  might  be  commuted  to  imprisonment  in  the 
penitentiary,  and  in  the  case  of  Coppie,  Wise  used  his 
influence  to  secure  this  end.  It  is  said  that  the  legisla 
ture  would  probably  have  done  this  in  the  latter's  case 
but  for  the  powerful  speech  of  Isbell,  the  senator  from 
Jefferson  and  Berkeley,  delivered  against  it. 

From  the  time  of  the  raid  at  Harper's  Ferry  until  after 
the  execution  of  Shields,  Green,  Coppie,  Stevens,  and 
Copeland,  on  December  16,  a  force  of  militia,  varying  in 
numbers  from  several  hundred  to  sixteen  hundred  at  one 
time,  was  kept  on  duty  at  Charlestown  and  neighboring 
points  along  the  Potomac.  The  presence  of  this  number 
of  military  on  duty  has  often  been  remarked  upon  and 
pointed  out  as  an  indication  of  the  weakness  attaching 
to  the  institution  of  slavery,  on  the  one  hand,  and  on  the 
other,  as  an  evidence  of  Wise's  love  of  display  and  rodo 
montade,  and  an  attempt  on  the  part  of  himself  and  others 
to  make  political  capital  out  of  the  affair.  But  there 
seems  to  be  no  good  reason  to  doubt  that  the  exigencies 
of  the  occasion  and  the  exposed  condition  of  the  border 
counties  necessitated  the  assembling  of  a  considerable 
body  of  troops,  in  and  around  Charlestown,  and  that  the 
failure  to  do  so  would  probably  have  resulted  in  a  further 
shedding  of  blood.  Concerning  this  subject,  Mr.  Andrew 
Hunter  wrote  :  "  As  justifying  the  assembling  of  so  many' 
troops  at  Charlestown  and  in  the  neighborhood,  I  deem  it 
proper  and  especially  in  justification  of  Governor  Wise, 
to  state  that  very  soon  after  the  prisoners  were  arrested, 
and  while  the  trials  were  progressing,  I  learned  (and  he 
through  me),  from  Brown's  intercepted  correspondence 
and  from  various  other  sources,  that  there  were  combina 
tions  being  formed  in  various  parts  of  the  United  States, 
chiefly  in  Pennsylvania,  Ohio,  and  Kentucky,  of  armed 
parties  for  the  purpose  of  coming  on  here  and  releasing 


256  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

the  prisoners."  The  papers  contained  in  Brown's  carpet 
bag,  together  with  others,  were  formally  laid  before  the 
legislature ;  and  on  January  the  26th,  1860,  the  joint  com 
mittee  of  the  two  branches  of  that  body,  appointed  to 
consider  the  subject  of  the  Harper's  Ferry  raid,  submitted 
their  report,  prepared  by  Alexander  H.  H.  Stuart,  the 
chairman  of  that  committee  :  — 

"  The  evidence  before  your  committee  is  sufficient  to 
show  the  existence,  in  a  number  of  Northern  States,  of 
a  widespread  conspiracy,  not  merely  against  Virginia,  but 
against  the  peace  and  security  of  all  the  Southern  States. 
But  the  careful  erasure  of  names  and  dates  from  many 
of  the  papers  found  in  Brown's  possession  renders  it  diffi 
cult  to  procure  legal  evidence  of  the  guilt  of  the  parties 
implicated.  The  conviction  of  the  existence  of  such  a 
conspiracy  is  deepened  by  the  sympathy  with  the  culprits, 
which  has  been  manifested  by  large  numbers  of  persons 
in  the  Northern  States,  and  by  the  disposition  which  your 
committee  are  satisfied  did  exist,  to  rescue  them  from  the 
custody  of  the  law. 

"Near  five  hundred  letters,  addressed  to  Governor  Wise, 
after  the  arrest  of  Brown  and  his  confederates,  have  been 
inspected  by  your  committee.  Many  of  these  were  anony 
mous  and  evidently  written  in  bad  faith,  but  the  greater 
number  were  genuine  letters,  apparently  from  respectable 
sources.  In  some  instances,  the  authors  professed  to  state, 
from  their  own  knowledge,  and  in  others,  from  information 
which  they  credited,  that  there  were  organizations  on 
foot,  in  various  States  and  neighborhoods,  to  effect  the 
rescue  of  Brown  and  his  associates;  and  they,  therefore, 
urged  the  governor  to  concentrate  a  sufficient  military 
force  about  Charlestown  (the  county  seat  of  Jefferson) 
to  frustrate  all  such  purposes.  Several  ministers  of  the 
Gospel  and  other  citizens,  who  valued  the  peace  and 


KEPORT   OF   THE   LEGISLATIVE   COMMITTEE  257 

harmony  of  the  country,  appealed  to  Governor  Wise,  as 
a  measure  of  humanity,  and  to  save  the  effusion  of  blood, 
to  assemble  such  a  body  of  troops  around  the  prison  as 
would  intimidate  the  sympathizers  from  attempting  a 
rescue. 

"  They  justly  foresaw  that  even  an  abortive  attempt, 
attended  with  loss  of  life,  would,  in  all  probability,  be  fol 
lowed  by  disastrous  consequences  to  the  peace  of  the 
country. 

"  Pending  the  trials  and  after  the  conviction  of  the 
prisoners,  a  great  many  letters  were  received  by  the  gov 
ernor,  from  citizens  of  Northern  States,  urging  him  to 
pardon  the  offenders,  or  to  commute  their  punishment. 
Some  of  them  were  written  in  a  spirit  of  menace,  threaten 
ing  his  life  and  that  of  members  of  his  family,  if  he  should 
fail  to  comply  with  their  demands.  Others  gave  notice 
of  the  purpose  of  resolute  bands  of  desperadoes  to  fire  the 
principal  towns  and  cities  of  Virginia,  and  thus  obtain 
revenge  by  destroying  the  property  and  lives  of  our  citi 
zens.  Others  appealed  to  his  clemency,  to  his  magnanim 
ity,  and  to  his  hopes  of  future  political  promotion,  as 
presenting  motives  for  his  intervention  in  behalf  of  the 
convicted  felons.  Another  class  (and  among  these  were 
letters  from  men  of  national  reputation)  besought  him  to 
pardon  them  on  the  ground  of  public  policy.  The  writers 
professed  to  be  thoroughly  informed  as  to  the  condition 
of  public  sentiment  in  the  North,  and  represented  it  as  so 
favorable  to  the  pardon  or  commutation  of  punishment 
of  the  prisoners  as  to  render  it  highly  expedient,  if  not 
necessary,  to  interpose  the  executive  prerogative  of  mercy, 
to  conciliate  this  morbid  popular  opinion  in  the  North. 

"  The  testimony  before  the  committee  amply  vindicates 
the  conduct  of  the  executive  in  assembling  a  strong  mili 
tary  force  at  the  scene  of  excitement ;  and  the  promptness 


258  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

and  energy  with  which  he  discharged  his  duty  merit  and 
doubtless  will  receive  the  commendation  of  the  legislature 
and  people  of  the  State.  .  .  .  The  invasion  of  a  sovereign 
State  by  citizens  of  other  States  confederated  with  subjects 
of  a  foreign  government,  presents  matter  for  grave  con 
sideration.  It  is  an  event  without  a  parallel  in  the  history 
of  our  country.  And  when  we  remember  that  the  incur 
sion  was  marked  by  distinct  geographical  features ;  that 
it  was  made  by  citizens  of  Northern  States  on  a  Southern 
State ;  that  all  the  countenance  and  encouragement  which 
it  received,  and  all  the  material  aid  which  was  extended 
to  it,  were  by  citizens  of  Northern  States ;  and  that  its 
avowed  object  was  to  make  war  upon  and  overthrow  an 
institution  intimately  interwoven  with  all  the  interests 
of  the  Southern  States,  and  constituting  an  essential  ele 
ment  of  their  social  and  political  systems,  —  an  institution 
which  had  existed  in  Virginia  for  more  than  two  centuries, 
and  which  is  recognized  and  guaranteed  by  the  mutual 
covenants  between  the  North  and  the  South,  embodied  in 
the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  —  every  thoughtful 
mind  must  be  filled  with  deep  concern  and  anxiety  for  the 
future  peace  and  security  of  the  country." 

The  report  closed-  with  a  strong  appeal  to  the  conserva 
tive  element  of  the  North,  and  an  allusion  to  the  devotion 
of  Virginia  to  the  Union,  as  true  as  it  was  beautiful. 

It  is  doubtless  true  that  the  mass  of  intelligent,  con 
servative  people  at  the  North  recognized  that  Brown  had 
committed  crimes,  for  which  he  deserved  the  full  penalty 
of  the  law ;  and  few,  if  any,  of  the  members  of  Congress 
at  the  time  condemned  his  punishment  as  unjust,  though 
some  thought  that  it  would  have  been  better,  as  an  act 
of  policy,  to  have  had  him  adjudged  insane.  Neither  is 
it  to  be  wondered  at  that  the  political  convention  which 
nominated  Abraham  Lincoln  for  the  presidency,  in  1860, 


THE   EXECUTION   OF   JOHN   BROWN  259 

resolved  that  Brown  was  a  criminal.  But  when  we  re 
member  the  character  of  the  events  of  the  period  and  the 
situation  of  the  Southern  people,  it  is  but  natural  that  they 
should  have  viewed  the  subject  as  they  did.  Throughout 
the  North,  public  meetings  had  been  held,  bells  tolled,  and 
orations  delivered,  proclaiming  Brown  a  hero  and  a  mar 
tyr,  and  that  Virginia  was  but  another  Algiers.  It  became 
matter  of  common  notoriety  that  Brown's  plans  had  long 
been  known  and  approved  by  men  like  Gerrit  Smith, 
Theodore  Parker,  Thomas  Wentworth  Higginson,  Ralph 
Waldo  Emerson,  Charles  Sumner,  Henry  Thoreau,  Wen 
dell  Phillips,  Governor  John  A.  Andrew,  and  others. 
Emerson  had  said  in  his  Salem  speech :  "  It  would  be 
nearer  the  truth  to  say  that  all  people,  in  proportion  to 
their  sensibility  and  self-respect,  sympathize  with  John 
Brown."  And  when  to  the  vast  concourse  assembled  in 
Tremont  Temple  the  day  of  Brown's  execution,  the  Hon. 
John  Q.  A.  Griffin  declared  that  "  The  heinous  offence  of  J 
Pontius  Pilate,  in  crucifying  our  Saviour,  whitened  into 
virtue  when  compared  with  that  of  Governor  Wise  in  his 
conduct  toward  John  Brown,"  the  sentence  was  far  from 
displeasing  his  auditors,  and  it,  with  similar  declarations, 
was  approved  by  many  newspapers.  The  Hon.  Eli 
Thayer  is  authority  for  the  statement  that  when  John 
Brown  arrived  in  Kansas,  he  said,  "  I  have  not  come  to 
make  Kansas  free,  but  to  get  a  shot  at  the  South." 
Though  he  did  not  live  to  see  it,  he  played  no  insignificant 
part  in  bringing  about  that  result,  on  a  scale  even  greater, 
perhaps,  than  he  had  dreamed. 

In  narrating  the  gathering  storms    that   hovered  over  - ' 
a  portion  of  Wise's  administration,  we  have  omitted  to 
mention  two  patriotic  occasions  over  which  he  presided, 
memorable   in   the   history    of    Richmond   and   Virginia. 
During  the  month  of  July,  1858,  the  remains  of  James 


260  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

Monroe  had  been  brought  from  their  resting-place  in  New 
York,  accompanied  by  the  gallant  Seventh  Regiment, 
under  the  command  of  Colonel  Duryee,  and  interred  in 
Hollywood  Cemetery,  in  the  presence  of  a  vast  concourse 
of  people,  in  the  soil  of  his  native  State. 

On  the  22d  of  February,  preceding  that  event,  had 
occurred  a  patriotic  outpouring  of  the  people,  such  as  had 
never  before  been  witnessed  in  Virginia.  The  superb 
equestrian  statue  of  Washington,  designed  by  the  artist 
Crawford,  was  unveiled;  and  despite  the  bleak,  wintry 
day,  the  enthusiasm  of  the  audience  knew  no  bounds.  As 
the  governor  of  the  State,  it  fell  to  Wise  to  welcome  the 
vast  multitude,  and  standing  amid  the  falling  snow,  he 
spoke  as  follows:  "Virginia  has  called  the  Nation,  its 
Elders  and  Councillors ;  her  sister  States,  their  Governors, 
Lawgivers,  and  Judges ;  her  own  People  and  all  the  chil 
dren  of  this  Confederate  Family  of  Freedom,  to  assemble 
this  anniversary  birthday  around  the  Monument  she  has 
raised  to  the  memory  of  that  son  whose  wisdom,  valor, 
virtue  won  the  grandest,  proudest,  purest  of  all  earthly 
titles,  4  Father  of  his  Country ' !  In  her  name  I  bid  you 
all  —  all  I  welcome  to  the  gathering  around  Virginia's 
Monument  to  Washington. 

"  Magic  name  !  If  none  other  under  heaven  can  draw 
us  to  each  other,  that  talisman  can  touch  the  chords  of 
unison,  and  clasp  us  hand  to  hand  and  bind  us  heart  to 
heart,  in  the  kindred  heirship  of  one  Patriot  Father!  — 
Before  that  august  name  Feud  and  Faction  stand  abashed ; 
Civil  Discord  hushes  into  awed  silence ;  schism  and  sec 
tions  are  subdued  and  vanish ;  for  in  the  very  naming  of 
that  name,  there  is  the  sweet  concord  of  Love,  Veneration, 
Gratitude,  Duty,  Patriotism,  and  Self-devotion;  in  it 
there  is  the  harmony  of  peace  and  the  power  only  of  vic 
torious  war,  and  the  spell  of  Order  and  Liberty  and  Law, 


THE   WASHINGTON   MONUMENT  261 

and  the  strength  and  beauty  of  National  Union.  It  typi 
fies  all  that  there  is  and  ought  to  be  of  goodness,  great 
ness,  and  majesty  in  that  country  we  call  4  Our  Country  ' ! 
—  the  United  States  of  America.  And  that  country  is 
the  best  type  of  its  father. 

"  We  will,  then,  this  day  gather  together  the  National 
Affections  and  bind  them  as  American  fasces  around  this 
Statue  erected  by  the  Mother  State  to  the  Father  Son. 
Virginia  — 

"  '  Parent  of  valor,  cast  away  thy  fear ! 

Mother  of  men,  be  proud  without  a  tear  1 ' 

What  a  theme !     What  a  scene  for  men  and  angels. 

"  May  our  God,  in  whose  bosom  he  rests,  who  guarded 
him  in  our  country's  battles  and  who  guided  him  in  our 
country's  councils,  vouchsafe  that  his  spirit  may  continue 
to  hover  over  the  land  he  saved  and  perpetuate  it  peace 
ful,  powerful,  plentiful,  and  free,  through  all  vicissitudes 
of  storm  and  sunshine,  until  earthly  monuments  shall 
moulder  into  dust  and  humanity  shall  triumph  over  the 
probation  of  Time,  or  Time  itself  shall  be  no  more." 


CHAPTER   XV 

PURCHASES  "ROLLESTON"  NEAR  NORFOLK.  DECLINES  TO  BE 
A  CANDIDATE  BEFORE  THE  CHARLESTON  CONVENTION. 
SUPPORTS  BRECKENRIDGE  AND  LANE.  OPPOSES  SECESSION 
AND  FAVORS  "  FIGHTING  IN  THE  UNION."  THE  VIRGINIA 
CONVENTION  OF  1861  AND  WISEJS  PART  IN  IT 

PRIOR  to  the  expiration  of  his  term  as  governor,  Wise 
had  determined  to  make  his  home  on  the  western  side  of 
the  Chesapeake,  on  account  of  the  inaccessibility  of  his 
farm  in  Accomack;  and  during  the  fall  of  the  year  1859 
purchased  from  his  brother,  John  C.  Wise,  a  fine  estate 
in  Princess  Anne  County,  consisting  of  about  nine  hun 
dred  acres  of  land.  This  place,  called  "  Rolleston,"  was 
located  on  the  eastern  branch  of  the  Elizabeth  River, 
some  seven  miles  from  Norfolk,  and  in  former  years  had 
been  the  home  of  the  descendants  of  William  Moseley, 
who,  having  emigrated  to  Virginia  in  1649,  had  obtained 
the  land  as  a  grant,  and  here  built  his  dwelling-house 
named  for  "  Rolleston  Hall,"  the  seat  of  the  Moseleys  in 
Staffordshire. 

In  October,  1859,  Wise  wrote  in  a  letter  to  his  friend 
George  Booker,  of  Hampton  :  "  I  have  sold  my  land  in 
Accomack  — got  $18,000.00  cash  for  '  Only  '  and  have 
about  $4,000  more  to  sell.  This  and  stocks  and  other 
means  make  me  about  $35,000  besides  my  negroes.  Out 
of  this  I  must  pay  every  dollar  of  debt,  from  5,000  to  8,000 
dollars,  and  start  again.  I  can't  go  back  to  law,  except  in 

262 


PURCHASE   OF   ROLLESTON  263 

fancy  cases,  and  must  rely  on  land  and  negroes.  I  have  * 
about  128,000  to  invest.  I  want  to  put  12,000  or  15,000 
in  land — about  8,000  or  10,000  in  negroes  —  leaving  some 
$5,000  in  cash  for  a  margin.  This  will  enable  me  to  work 
eighteen  or  twenty  hands,  men  and  boys,  of  effective  field 
force,  and  to  wield  that  force  I  must  have  a  good  located 
farm  in  good  condition."  l 

The  Rolleston  estate  was  finely  timbered  and  had  a 
good  saw  and  grist  mill  on  it,  and  would  doubtless  have 
been  an  excellent  investment,  if  purchased  at  any  other 
time.  Here  Wise  retired,  immediately  after  the  expira 
tion  of  his  term  of  office  at  Richmond,  but  it  was  not  long 
before  his  name  was  again  prominently  connected  with  polit 
ical  affairs.  His  followers  were  anxious  that  he  should 
be  brought  forward  as  a  presidential  candidate,  and  his 
cause  was  strongly  championed  by  the  Richmond  Enquirer 
and  other  papers  throughout  Virginia  and  the  South. 
The  Virginia  Democratic  Convention  assembled  in  the 
spring  of  1860  for  the  purpose  of  selecting  delegates  to 
represent  the  State,  in  the  Charleston  Convention,  but 
declined  to  express  a  preference  for  any  candidate ;  and  it 
is  probable  that  the  followers  of  R.  M.  T.  Hunter  were  in 
a  majority  in  that  body,  though  Wise  was  doubtless  the 
more  popular  among  the  people  at  large.  In  a  letter, 
written  for  the  press,  in  April,  1860,  he  said:  "Whomever 
else  the  preference  has  been  expressed  for,  it  has  not  been 
expressed  for  me.  Without  the  voice  of  Virginia  clearly 
and  indisputably  declared  for  me,  I  decline  to  allow  my 
name  to  be  presented  primarily  before  the  Convention 
for  a  nomination.  In  no  event  am  I  willing  that  it  shall 
cause  any  division  of  the  vote  of  our  delegation.  I  beg 

1  The  records  of  Princess  Anne  County  show  that  he  owned  twenty- 
one  slaves  in  1860  —  a  number  much  above  the  average  held  in  that 
locality,  which  probably  did  not  exceed  three  or  four  negroes  to  a  planter. 


264  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

my  friends,  therefore,  not  to  offer  my  name,  but  to  unite 
cordially  with  the  majority  of  the  delegation  and  to  pre 
sent  the  vote  of  the  State  a  unit  before  the  Convention." 
In  accordance  with  his  wishes  he  was  not  placed  in 
nomination,  at  Charleston ;  and  the  action  of  that  Con 
vention  has  been  too  often  described,  and  is  too  famil 
iar  to  every  reader  of  American  history,  to  be  repeated 
here. 

Along  with  the  majority  of  Southern  Democrats,  Wise 
gave  his  support  to  the  ticket  headed  by  Breckenridge  and 
Lane ;  and  in  a  speech  delivered  at  Norfolk,  during  the 
campaign,  said:  "Squatter  sovereignty,  when  analyzed, 
is  nothing  in  effect  but  the  same  infamous  Lecompton 
tyranny  which  attempted  to  compel  a  people  to  be  all  one 
way.  In  Kansas,  by  the  odious  Lecompton  Constitution, 
the  people  were  allowed  to  vote  for  a  constitution,  but  not 
against  it.  They  were  allowed  to  vote  against  nothing  but 
slavery.  This  doctrine  Mr.  Douglas  opposed  most  right 
eously  and  I  backed  him  with  all  my  might,  in  maintaining 
the  popular  sovereignty  to  decide  pro  and  con  on  a  State 
constitution,  without  intervention  from  any  quarter.  And 
now  he  claims  the  power  in  a  majority  of  settlers  to  ex 
clude  the  property  of  a  minority.  If  he  excludes  their 
property,  he  excludes  them.  The  slave-owner  himself  won't 
go  to  Kansas,  if  he  may  not  take  his  slaves  with  him. 
What  is  the  result?  Why,  that  none  but  non-slaveholders 
will  go  there.  This  is  certain  from  the  very  nature,  or 
difference  in  the  nature,  of  slaveholding  and  non-slave- 
holding  population.  A  with  50  slaves  and  B  with  20 
from  Virginia  emigrate  to  Kansas.  They  have  taken  72 
people  from  us  to  Kansas.  They  will  require  1280  acres 
of  new  land  at  least.  Thus  72  people  from  a  slave  State 
will  cover  that  space,  and  how  many  votes  will  they  have  ? 
Why,  but  2.  Five  Emigrant  Aid  Society  men  go  out 


OPPOSES   SECESSION  265 

from  Vermont,  with  flocks  and  herds,  and  settle  40  acres 
each  —  200  acres  in  all,  and  they  will  count  5.  If  the  5 
may  exclude  the  70  slaves,  by  voting  5  to  2,  the  two  mas 
ters  will  never  go  there  and  have  their  slaves  caught  in 
this  territorial  trap.  Thus  the  5  are  left  the  monopoly  of 
the  Territory.  The  effect  of  squatter  sovereignty  is  to 
prevent  all  competition  in  settlement  and  compels  all 
to  be  free  soilers.  The  truth  is,  that  these  doctrines  of 
Mr.  Douglas  are  but  short  cuts  to  all  the  ends  of  Black 
Republicanism.  The  only  difference  between  Lincoln  and 
Douglas  is,  that  Lincoln  claims  the  power  and  duty  of 
Congress  to  abolish  slavery  in  the  Territories ;  and  Doug 
las  practises  intervention  and  preaches  non-intervention  by 
Congress,  but  claims  that  a  territorial  legislature,  a  mere 
creature  of  Congress,  a  most  subordinate  Federal  authority, 
can  intervene  to  abolish  property  in  slaves.  It  is  safer  for 
us  to  contest  the  power  in  Congress.  We  can't  risk  our 
slaves  to  contest  it  in  the  Territories.  In  Congress  we 
are  represented  and  in  the  Kansas  legislature  we  can't 
be." 

In  adverting  to  the  possible  action  of  Virginia,  in  the 
event  of  Lincoln's  election,  Wise  declared:  "In  tortur 
ing  suspense  I  shall  wait  upon  her  resolves,  and  pray  God 
they  may  be  worthy  of  the  example  of  '98  and  '99.  If  she 
does  not  meet  the  issue  and  come  up  to  the  mark  of  self- 
defence  and  self-respect,  I  will  look  to  another  and  another 
and  another,  until  some  one  sovereign  does  raise  the  rightful 
flag  of  Revolution.  Revolution  is  the  word.  I  take  Mr. 
Douglas  at  his  word.  Secession  is  revolution,  but  revolu 
tion  is  not  secession.  I  will  not  nullify,  I  will  not  secede, 
but  I  will  under  sovereign  State  authority  fight  in  the 
Union  another  revolutionary  conflict  for  civil  liberty,  and 
a  Union  which  will  defend  it.  Mr.  Madison  knew  his 
own  faith  better  than  South  Carolina  did.  His  Everett 


266  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

and  Ingersoll  letters  admitted  that  his  rule  of  State 
rights,  already  cited,  necessarily  led  to  conflict  of  judg 
ment,  and  of  modes  and  measures  of  redress,  and  if  pressed 
to  its  ultimate  results  would  end  in  revolution,  logically 
and  practically  end  there.  It  will  be  revolution,  then,  and 
to  bring  it  on  I  do  hope  that  no  one  slaveholding  State 
will  wait  for  another.  If  it  must  come,  let  it  come  as  soon 
as  possible." 

At  a  public  meeting  and  barbecue  held  in  Princess  Anne 
County  during  the  latter  part  of  October,  he  made  a  speech 
setting  forth  the  ills  under  which  the  South  had  suffered, 
and  declared  that  the  utterances  of  Lincoln  and  Seward 
that  "  the  government  cannot  endure  half  slave  and  half 
free,"  —  that  "  an  irrepressible  conflict  existed  between 
slave  and  white  labor,"  and  "  that  the  country  must  be 
come  all  one  or  the  other,"  would  in  the  event  of  the  for 
mer's  election  be  equivalent  to  an  open  and  official  avowal, 
by  the  people  of  the  North,  that  the  rights  of  the  South, 
under  the  Constitution,  were  to  be  disregarded.  He  of 
fered  a  set  of  resolutions,  which  were  enthusiastically 
adopted,  for  the  appointment  of  committees  of  safety,  in 
each  magisterial  district,  and  for  a  State  convention,  to 
meet  at  Richmond  immediately  upon  Lincoln's  election 
being  made  known.  The  Princess  Anne  meeting  created 
considerable  comment  at  the  time  and  the  Richmond 
Whig  announced  in  flaming  head-lines,  that  "  Revolu 
tion  "  had  been  "  Recommended  and  Begun  in  Virginia." 
But  the  meeting  cannot  be  said  to  have  reflected  the 
views  of  the  vast  majority  of  the  people  of  the  State,  who 
deprecated  war  in  any  event;  and  who  were,  moreover, 
opposed  to  anticipating  any  overt  act  on  the  part  of  the 
Federal  Government.  Months  and  months  had  passed, 
after  Lincoln's  election,  and  the  cotton  States  had  all 
seceded,  before  the  Virginia  Convention,  which  was  largely 


FAVORS   FIGHTING   IN  THE   UNION  267 

made  up  of  Whigs  and  Union  men,  at  last  passed  an 
ordinance  of  secession,  upon  receiving  the  announcement 
that  Sumter  had  fallen  and  Lincoln  issued  his  call  for 
troops. 

The  views  of  Wise  were  considered  peculiar,  as  he 
favored  neither  secession  nor  peaceable  acquiescence  in 
the  triumph  of  the  antislavery  and  sectional  party.  His 
opinions  of  the  proper  course  to  have  been  pursued  are 
contained  in  the  following  letter,  dated  "  Rolleston,"  near 
Norfolk,  Virginia,  December  1,  1860,  and  addressed  to  a 
friend  in  Georgia. 

"  DEAR  SIR  :  —  Yours  of  the  22nd  ult.  was  late  coming 
to  hand,  I  now  thank  you  for  it.  As  to  my  doctrine  of 
4  fighting  in  the  Union,'  it  is  one  of  true  policy. 

"  1st.  If  a  sovereign  State  is  judge  of  the  infraction  as 
well  as  of  the  mode  and  measure  of  redress,  she  may  re 
main  in  the  Union  to  resent  or  resist  wrongs  as  well  as  do 
so  out  of  the  Union. 

"  2d.  If  other  States  have  infracted  the  Union,  not  she, 
the  State  wronged  is  bound  to  defend  the  Constitution  and 
Union  against  those  who  have  infracted  the  one  and 
threatened  the  other.  Logically  the  Union  belongs  to 
those  who  have  kept,  not  those  who  have  broken,  its  cove 
nants. 

"  3d.  The  Union  is  not  an  abstraction ;  it  is  a  real,  sub 
stantial  thing,  embracing  many  essential  and  vital  political 
rights  and  properties.  It  has  nationality,  lands,  treasury, 
organization  of  army,  navy,  ships,  dock-yards,  arsenals,  etc. 
Shall  we  renounce  these  rights  and  possessions  because 
wrong-doers  attempt  to  deprive  us  of  other  rights  ?  Is  it 
not  cowardly  to  renounce  one  right  to  save  another  ?  Are 
these  rights  not  as  precious  as  the  mere  right  of  property 
in  negroes  ?  But, 


268  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

"  4th.  If  you  secede  you  not  only  renounce  the  Union 
and  its  possessions,  but  you  fail  to  unite  your  own  people, 
because  you  do  renounce  these  rights.  Wake  a  man  up 
to  destroy  the  Union  and  Constitution  and  he  will  stare 
at  you  and  turn  away.  But  tell  him  that  the  Constitu 
tion  is  infracted  and  the  Union  threatened  by  Black  Re 
publicans,  and  call  on  him  to  aid  you  in  defending  both 
against  those  who  would  destroy  both,  and  he  will  act 
heartily  with  you. 

"  5th.  Then  how  is  this  to  be  done  ?  The  3d  clause  of 
the  10th  section  of  the  1st  article  of  the  Constitution  of 
the  United  States  permits  a  State  to  keep  troops  and  ships 
of  war  in  time  of  peace,  and  to  engage  in  war,  when  act 
ually  invaded,  or  when  in  such  imminent  danger  as  will 
not  admit  of  delay.  Now  are  we  not  actually  invaded  ? 
Is  our  danger  not  imminent?  Does  it  admit  of  delay? 
May  not  a  sovereign  State  secede  ?  Will  it  not  be  revo 
lution  and  war  in  either  event? 

"  I  say,  then,  stick  to  all  your  rights,  renounce  none, 
fight  for  all,  and  save  all ! " 

Though  these  views  were  commended  by  the  Richmond 
Whig  and  a  few  men  of  prominence,  they  cannot  be  said 
to  have  had  any  considerable  following  in  Virginia. 

The  electoral  vote  of  the  State  was  cast  for  Bell  and 
Everett,  the  candidates  of  the  Constitutional  Union  party, 
in  1860 ;  and  the  old-line  Whig  and  Union  men  had,  like 
those  of  Tennessee  and  Kentucky,  pursued  this  course,  in 
an  earnest  effort  to  prevent  a  sectional  conflict,  the  brunt 
of  which  they  knew  would  be  borne  by  the  border  States. 
Every  consideration,  both  of  sentiment  and  self-interest, 
caused  Virginia  to  dread  a  civil  war  and  disruption  of  the 
Union.  As  the  eldest  of  the  original  thirteen  States,  she 
took  an  intense  pride  in  the  government,  to  the  formation 


THE   VIRGINIA   CONVENTION,    1861  269 

of  which  she  had  contributed  so  large  a  share  of  ability 
and  patriotism ;  while  her  geographical  position,  midway 
between  the  North  and  South,  on  the  Atlantic  seaboard, 
indicated  all  too  clearly  that  her  soil  would  be  the  scene 
of  the  fiercest  strife,  in  the  event  of  war. 

The  special  session  of  the  legislature,  which  met  at 
Richmond  in  January,  1861,  had  called  a  Peace  Congress 
of  all  the  States,  in  a  vain  but  earnest  endeavor  to  keep 
the  peace  and  preserve  the  Union ;  commissioners  had 
also  been  appointed  to  wait  on  Mr.  Lincoln  and  urge  a 
postponement  of  hostilities  for  sixty  days;  and  a  State  ~ 
Convention  was  called  to  consider  the  crisis  with  which 
the  people  of  the  Commonwealth  were  then  confronted. 
This  last  body,  among  the  most  memorable  ever  assembled 
on  her  soil,  met  in  the  city  of  Richmond,  on  the  13th  of 
February,  1861,  and  for  two  months  discussed  the  various 
propositions  presented,  with  a  view  to  adjusting  the  rela 
tions  existing  between  Virginia  and  the  Federal  Govern 
ment,  on  a  basis  alike  honorable  to  both.  The  foremost 
men  of  the  Commonwealth,  Whigs  and  Democrats,  sat 
side  by  side,  to  take  counsel  as  to  the  course  of  their 
mother  State. 

Wise,  though  but  a  short  time  resident  in  the  county 
of  Princess  Anne,  had  been  nominated,  without  solicitation 
on  his  part,  to  represent  her  people,  and  though  he  made 
no  canvass  was  elected  by  a  large  majority.  Shortly  after 
the  assembling  of  the  Convention,  he  was  appointed  to  a 
place  on  the  most  important  committee  of  the  body,  that  , 
on  Federal  Relations,  which  embraced  among  its  list  of 
members  Robert  Y.  Conrad,  John  B.  Baldwin,  Robert  E. 
Scott,  William  Ballard  Preston,  Lewis  E.  Harvie,  Will 
iam  H.  McFaiiand,  Robert  L.  Montague,  Valentine  W. 
Southall,  Waitman  T.  Willey,  James  C.  Bruce,  James 
Barbour,  William  C.  Rives,  Samuel  McD.  Moore,  and 


270  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

others,  prominently  identified  with  the  past  history  of  the 
State. 

Within  a  few  days  after  the  Convention  met,  commis 
sioners  from  South  Carolina,  Georgia,  and  Mississippi 
appeared  before  the  body  and  earnestly  and  eloquently 
pleaded  with  it  to  cast  in  the  lot  of  Virginia  with  that  of 
her  Southern  sisters,  and  join  the  Confederacy,  newly 
formed  at  Montgomery.  But  while  a  majority  of  the 
delegates  believed  in  the  constitutional  right  of  a  State  to 
withdraw  from  the  Union,  they  were  opposed  to  being 
needlessly  dragged  into  a  quarrel,  not  of  their  making,  as 
well  as  to  being  coerced  by  the  Federal  Government.  Of 
the  twenty-one  members  who  composed  the  committee  on 
Federal  Relations,  sixteen  were  avowed  Union  men  and,  at 
the  commencement  of  the  session,  like  a  great  majority  of 
the  delegates,  favored  any  sort  of  delay  or  compromise,  in 
preference  to  the  horrors  of  war.  Wise  was  one  of  the 
minority  of  five  and,  although  at  first  opposed  to  secession, 
believed  in  putting  the  State  in  a  condition  to  defend  her 
self  and  repel  invasion.  From  the  first  he  does  not 
appear  to  have  entertained  a  belief  in  any  peaceable  solu 
tion  of  the  difficulty  and,  on  February  18,  1861,  wrote 
in  a  letter  to  his  son,  Richard  A.  Wise :"...!  am  con 
fident  there  are  a  number  who  would  vote  for  abject  sub 
mission  and  abolition  of  slavery  to-morrow.  But  I  still 
have  hope.  A  committee  on  Federal  Relations  is  appointed 
—  twenty-one,  of  which  I  am  one.  I  had  a  hopeful  con 
ference  yesterday  with  some  of  its  members  from  whom  I 
received  some  considerable  consolation,  but  I  now  see 
that  the  fate  of  slavery  is  doomed  in  Virginia  and  we  have 
no  hope  but  in  actual  Revolution." 

The  committee  did  not  submit  a  report  until  March  9, 
and  then  but  a  partial  one,  accompanied  by  several  minority 
papers  and  substitutes,  indicating  considerable  division  of 


REPORT   OF   COMMITTEE   ON   FEDERAL  RELATIONS       271 

sentiment  as  to  the  proper  course  to  be  pursued.  A 
lengthy  debate  ensued,  which  lasted  for  weeks  and  which 
was  participated  in  by  nearly  all  of  the  prominent  mem 
bers.  The  report  of  the  committee,  which  set  forth  the 
wrongs  under  which  the  Southern  States  were  suffering 
and  proposed  various  constitutional  amendments  and  com 
promises,  as  well  as  a  convention  of  the  border  States  to 
be  held  at  Frankfort,  Kentucky,  was  ably  discussed  in  all 
its  details.  Wise  submitted  a  substitute  at  the  time  the 
main  report  was  presented,  demanding  of  the  various 
States  satisfactory  guarantees  for  the  protection  of  slave 
property,  which  were  to  be  given  prior  to  October  1, 
1861,  and  in  the  meanwhile  it  was  to  be  recommended  that 
neither  the  Federal  Government  nor  seceded  States  should 
commence  hostilities,  and  that  the  former  should  reduce 
the  force  at  all  forts  in  the  Southern  States  to  a  number 
requisite  for  garrison  duty  only,  pending  this  period.  It 
was  further  provided  that  the  Commonwealth  should  be 
immediately  placed  in  a  complete  state  of  military  organi 
zation  for  defence ;  and  that  it  should  be  forthwith  sub 
mitted  to  the  people  to  determine  whether,  if  the  demands 
of  Virginia  were  not  satisfactorily  responded  to,  or  civil 
war  commenced  on  the  part  of  the  Federal  Government, 
within  the  period  named  pending  the  efforts  for  adjust 
ment,  they  would  or  not  resume  the  powers  granted  by 
them  under  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States ;  and 
that  the  Convention  should  place  itself  immediately  in 
communication  with  the  border  slaveholding  States  for 
conference  and  cooperation. 

During  the  anxious  weeks  of  delay  which  followed,  the 
members  of  the  Convention  were  derided  as  "  subrnission- 
ists,"  by  the  secessionists  throughout  the  Commonwealth, 
and  the  state  of  feeling  among  this  last  element  was  well 
illustrated  by  a  clever  satire  which  was  published  at  the 


272  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.    WISE 

time  in  the  Richmond  Examiner,  under  the  title  of  the 
"Parliament  of  Beasts."  The  writer,  a  civil  engineer 
named  Lorraine,  cleverly  caricatured  the  various  delegates, 
comparing  them  to  different  animals,  who  were  represented 
as  rendering  homage  to  King  Abe,  the  chief  of  the  orang 
outangs. 

On  the  4th  of  April,  Lewis  E.  Harvie,  the  member  from 
Amelia  County,  and  who  along  with  ex-President  Tyler 
and  the  brilliant  Holcombe  of  Albemarle  was  considered 
among  the  leaders  on  the  disunion  side  at  this  time, 
moved  that  the  committee  on  Federal  Relations  be  in 
structed  to  report  an  ordinance  of  secession;  which 
motion,  however,  was  defeated  by  a  vote  of  88  to  45, 
indicating  the  large  preponderance  of  Union  sentiment, 
even  at  that  date.  Wise,  although  opposed  in  the  begin 
ning  to  secession,  voted  for  Harvie's  resolution,  as  the 
drift  of  events  naturally  identified  him  with  this  element, 
despite  the  fact  that  he  had  favored  "fighting  in  the 
Union "  and  the  assumption  of  an  attitude  of  armed  neu 
trality  on  the  part  of  Virginia,  between  the  government  at 
Washington,  on  the  one  hand,  and  that  at  Montgomery  on 
the  other. 

Wise's  idea  of  "  fighting  in  the  Union "  was  not  the 
prevailing  sentiment  among  the  members  on  either  side  of 
the  Convention,  as  his  views  on  this  point  were  regarded 
as  eccentric  and  peculiar ;  and  those  of  the  delegates  who 
no  longer  remained  attached  to  the  government  at  Wash 
ington  approved  of  Virginia  casting  in  her  lot  with  the 
Confederacy. 

During  this  period  of  doubt  and  apparent  unwillingness 
to  take  her  stand,  Virginia  incurred  the  harsh  criticisms  of 
her  sister  States,  both  North  and  South.  But  to  the 
utter  failure  of  the  Peace  Conference  and  the  unsatisfac 
tory  report  of  the  commissioners  from  Virginia,  appointed 


THE  FALL   OF   SUMTER  273 

on  the  8th  of  April  to  confer  with  Mr.  Lincoln,  were  to 
be  added  still  more  ominous  events,  when  the  wires 
brought  the  news  that  Sumter  had  fallen  and  Lincoln's 
call  for  troops  to  invade  the  South  had  been  made. 

As  late  as  April  10,  Wise,  although  among  the  "fire- 
eaters  "  in  the  Convention,  had  said  on  the  floor  of  that 
body  :  "  As  to  parting  from  the  Union,  in  my  affections  I 
shall  never  do  that.  As  to  leaving  its  flag,  whenever  I 
leave  this  Confederacy,  this  North  Star  Confederacy,  which 
makes  the  needle  tremble  northward,  sir,  I  shall  carry  the 
flag  of  the  Old  Union  out  with  me  ;  and  if  I  ever  have  to 
fight,  so  help  me  God,  I  will  fight  with  the  star-spangled 
banner  still  in  one  hand  and  my  musket  in  the  other.  I 
will  never  take  any  Southern  cross  or  any  palmetto  for  my 
flag.  I  will  never  admit  that  a  Yankee  can  drive  me  from 
the  Union  and  take  from  me  our  Capitol!  I  will  take 
from  him  forts,  I  will  take  from  him  flags,  I  will  take  from 
him  our  Capitol,  I  will  take  from  him,  if  I  can,  my  whole 
country,  and  save  the  whole."  But  while  his  idea  up  to 
this  time  had  been  to  fight  in  the  Union,  if  possible,  he 
had  never  denied,  but  on  the  contrary  stoutly  contended 
for,  the  right  of  a  State  to  withdraw  and  resume  her  dele 
gated  powers,  whenever  she  saw  fit  to  do  so. 

The  vast  majority  of  the  members  of  the  Convention 
had  been  Union  men,  almost  to  the  very  last,  but  to  the 
stanchest  Whig,  as  well  as  Democrat,  the  conception  of  a 
Union  meant  a  sisterhood  of  co-sovereign  States,  and  not 
a  consolidated  government  held  together  by  force  and 
arms.  Whatever  may  have  been  the  true  construction  of 
the  Constitution,  or  what  the  faith  taught  elsewhere,  the 
States-rights  principles  had  been  those  enunciated  by  the 
Virginia  statesmen ;  and  the  idea  of  the  Federal  Govern 
ment,  the  creature  of  the  several  States  and  an  agent  of 
limited  and  derivative  powers  only,  attempting  to  coerce 


274  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.   WISE 

and  invade  its  creators,  was  repugnant  to  the  teachings  of 
her  statesmen  and  the  instincts  of  her  people.  With  her 
past  history  and  beliefs,  she  was  bound  to  make  the  cause 
of  the  Gulf  States  her  cause,  when  at  last  the  crisis  came> 
and  circumstances  which  she  could  not  control  compelled 
that  she  should  take  her  stand.  That  her  soil  would  be 
reddened  by  the  blood  of  contending  hosts  and  her  fields 
devastated  could  not  change  this  fact.  The  men  who 
voted  for  the  ordinance,  offered  by  William  Ballard  Pres 
ton,  on  April  17,  1861,  could  with  truth  utter  the  words 
of  the  great  Athenian :  "  I  say  that  if  the  event  had  been 
manifest  to  the  whole  world  beforehand,  not  even  then 
ought  Athens  to  have  forsaken  this  course,  if  she  had  any 
regard  for  her  glory  or  for  her  past  or  for  the  ages  to 
come." 

By  the  16th  of  April,  the  news  of  Sumter  and  of  Lin 
coln's  action  had  spread  abroad  in  Richmond,  and  the 
excited  state  of  public  feeling  was  shown,  not  only  by 
the  Confederate  flags  to  be  seen  here  and  there,  but  by 
a  spontaneous  gathering,  or  "people's  convention,"  as 
sembled  in  Metropolitan  Hall,  ready  to  anticipate  the 
passage  of  the  ordinance  by  the  official  body  sitting  near 
by.  This  measure  had  been  offered  that  day  by  Preston 
of  Montgomery  County,  and  though  the  Convention  had 
adjourned  without  taking  a  vote,  it  was  now  apparent  that 
on  the  morrow  the  die  would  be  cast. 

The  story  of  the  capture  of  Harper's  Ferry,  and  the 
manner  in  which  the  movement  was  inaugurated  by  Wise, 
has  been  so  graphically  narrated  by  a  participant 1  in  some 
of  the  scenes,  that  we  have  introduced  it  here,  though  in 
slightly  condensed  form  :  — 

"  After  many  weeks  of  very  trying  debate,  principally 
participated  in  by  Robert  E.  Scott  and  John  B.  Baldwin 

1  General  John  D.  Imboden. 


THE   CAPTURE   OF   HARPER'S   FERRY  275 

on  the  one  side,  and  Henry  A.  Wise  on  the  other;  and 
after  the  committee,  by  a  vote  of  13  to  8,  had  rejected 
the  proposition  of  Mr.  Wise  to  take  a  stand  of  armed 
neutrality  between  the  Federal  powers  of  Washington 
City  and  the  Confederate  powers  at  Montgomery,  and  to 
fight  in  the  Union  against  the  invasion  of  either  by  the 
other,  and  to  prevent  the  troops  of  either  from  crossing 
the  territory  of  Virginia ;  and  when  it  had  become  mani 
fest  that  the  people  in  the  State  were  becoming  impatient 
at  the  inaction  of  the  Convention,  Wise,  worn  down  by 
overwork  and  anxiety  and  despairing  of  any  fair  adjust 
ment  or  prompt  action,  was  walking  from  the  committee, 
the  sittings  of  which  were  held  in  the  Mechanics  Hall,  on 
Bank  Street,  and  met  Captain  J.  D.  Imboden  on  the  pave 
ment,  near  Tenth,  next  the  Capitol  Square.  After  a 
pleasant  salutation,  Wise  spoke  to  Imboden  of  his  impa 
tience  at  the  delay  of  the  Convention,  and  of  the  dark 
prospect  of  events,  and  said,  4Do  you  remember,  sir, 
what  passed  between  you  and  me,  when  I  was  governor, 
at  the  moment  when  you  thanked  me  for  the  order  per 
mitting  you  to  have  two  brass  field-pieces  for  your  com 
pany  of  artillery  at  Staunton  ? ' 

"  Captain  Imboden  replied,  4  Yes,  I  do,  sir,'  and  repeated 
that  he  was  bound  to  obey  the  call  of  Wise  for  those  guns 
whenever  made.  Wise  then  said:  'What  was  a  joke 
then,  is  earnest  now.  I  want  those  guns  with  which  to 
aid  in  the  immediate  capture  of  the  United  States  Arsenal 
at  Harper's  Ferry ;  can  they  be  had  with  all  the  men  you 
can  raise  ? '  Captain  Imboden  replied,  '  They  can,  and  if 
you  say  so,  the  men  shall  be  raised  and  the  arsenal  shall 
be  taken.'  Wise  then  inquired,  4  What  boys,  reliable  and 
brave,  are  in  town  ? '  Imboden  named  several  and  prom 
ised  to  look  immediately  for  others,  and  Wise  told  him  to 
notify  as  many  such  as  he  could  find  in  the  city,  to  meet 


276  THE  LIFE   OP   HENRY   A.   WISE 

him  at  the  Exchange  Hotel  at  about  seven  o'clock  P.M. 
At  the  hour  named  Captain  Imboden  had  assembled,  in  a 
room  on  the  first  floor  of  the  hotel  passage  to  the  left  of 
the  entrance  as  you  go  in,  Oliver  Funsten,  Richard  Ashby, 
Turner  Ashby,  John  S.  Barbour,  Alfred  Barbour,  John  A. 
Harman,  and  J.  D.  Imboden,  who  were  joined  by  Wise. 
Wise  stated  to  them  the  object  of  calling  them  together. 
Turner  Ashby  asked  what  was  proposed.  Wise  replied 
that  the  first  thing  required  was  some  official,  or  semblance 
of  official,  authority,  to  make  the  movement,  and  proposed 
the  appointment  of  a  committee  of  three  to  wait  on  Gov 
ernor  Letcher  and  to  ascertain  whether  he  would  support 
or  countenance,  at  least,  an  attempt  to  secure  the  arms 
and  munitions  of  war  at  Harper's  Ferry.  The  proposition 
was  at  once  adopted;  and  J.  D.  Imboden,  Oliver  Funsten, 
and  Alfred  Barbour  were  appointed  the  committee,  and 
the  meeting  waited  for  their  report  about  an  hour,  when 
they  returned  and  reported  briefly  that  Governor  Letcher 
declined  to  entertain  or  consider  the  matter,  as  he  was 
under  some  informal  pledge  not  to  do  so  or  promote  any 
hostile  action  against  the  United  States,  without  first  ap 
prising  the  Convention  and  conferring  with  it.  Wise  then 
said,  '  Well,  gentlemen,  you  have  heard  the  report ;  are 
you  willing  and  ready  to  act  on  your  own  responsibility  ? ' 
The  meeting  unanimously  voted  to  act  without  official 
authority,  and  Turner  Ashby,  addressing  Wise,  said,  4  You 
have  been  governor  of  Virginia,  and  we  will  take  orders 
from  you,  sir,  as  if  you  were  now  governor ;  please  draw 
your  orders.'  Wise  immediately  drew,  in  writing,  a  brief 
plan  of  action  and  the  orders  conformable  thereto.  Mr. 
Alfred  Barbour  was  then  superintendent  of  the  arsenal  at 
Harper's  Ferry;  he  was  directed  to  repair  to  the  arsenal 
at  once  and  to  prepare  the  operations  there.  Turner 
Ashby  was  despatched  at  once  to  Fauquier  to  rouse  the 


277 

Black-Horse  Cavalry  there.  Captain  Imboden  was  in 
structed  to  move  his  company  of  artillery  at  once,  and 
John  A.  Harman  was  sent  to  Staunton  to  rally  all  the 
volunteers  he  could  to  move  with  Imboden's  artillery. 
At  this  moment  Milton  Cary  came  into  the  meeting  and 
was  requested  to  see  to  railroad  transportation ;  went  out 
and  brought  in  Colonel  Edmund  Fontaine,  the  president 
of  the  Central  Railroad,  and  transportation  was  arranged. 
Whilst  the  meeting  was  in  session,  Wise  received  a  tele 
gram  saying  that  Federal  troops  were  on  their  way  to 
Harper's  Ferry,  which  was  read.  All  were  ordered  to 
report  promptly  to  Wise  and  to  move  at  once,  —  that 
night,  —  and  the  meeting  adjourned  sine  die.  The  whole 
time  of  the  meeting  for  report  and  all  did  not  occupy 
more  than  three  hours,  and  it  adjourned  about  eleven  P.M. 
"  In  passing  through  the  vestibule  of  the  hotel  where  the 
baggage  is  received  and  distributed,  the  clerk  handed  Wise 
a  despatch.  It  was  from  William  H.  Parker,  then  of  Nor 
folk,  now  of  Northampton,  and  to  this  effect:  'The 
powder  magazine  here  can  be  taken,  and  the  Yankee 
vessels  can  be  captured  and  sunk,  so  as  to  obstruct  the 
harbor.  Shall  we  do  it?'  Wise  wrote  at  once,  'Yes,' 
showed  the  telegram  and  answer  to  Mr.  Holcombe,  stand 
ing  by  his  side,  and  despatched  it.  The  next  morning  he 
awaited  telegrams  at  the  hotel  and  received  one  from 
Captain  Imboden,  at  Gordonsville,  saying  he  was  there 
with  the  volunteers  under  General  Harper,  and  his  guns, 
pressing  forward  to  Harper's  Ferry.  Wise  immediately 
hastened  to  the  Convention  then  in  session.  For  some 
weeks  previously  telegrams  had  been  announced  to  that 
body,  with  the  view  of  hastening  its  action,  until,  at  last, 
they  lost  their  effect  and  had  become  an  object  of  de 
rision.  As  soon  as  one  was  named,  voices  would  exclaim : 
'Another  Democratic  alarm!'  Immediately  upon  reach- 


278  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY  A.   WISE 

ing  his  seat,  Wise  addressed  the  president  and  said :  4  Mr. 
President,  I  arise  to  announce  no  4  Democratic  telegram,* 
but  to  say  to  you  and  this  body  that  I  know  that  armed 
forces  are  now  moving  upon  Harper's  Ferry  to  capture 
the  arms  there  in  the  arsenal  for  the  public  defence,  and 
there  will  be  a  fight  or  a  foot-race  between  volunteers  of 
Virginia  and  Federal  troops  before  the  sun  sets  this  day ! ' 
And  he  asked  the  Convention  whether  it  would  sanction 
and  support  the  movement  on  foot.  If  a  hand  grenade 
had  been  thrown  in  among  the  members,  it  could  not  have 
caused  more  consternation.  Wise  said  no  more,  but  went 
to  Mr.  Holcombe  and  Mr.  George  W.  Randolph,  told  them 
what  he  had  done  and  urged  them  to  see  Governor  Letcher 
and  to  prevail  upon  him  to  reenforce  the  volunteers  and  to 
sanction  their  movement.  They  went  immediately  to  the 
governor's  room  and  returned  quickly,  requesting  Wise's 
presence  with  Governor  Letcher.  He  went  forthwith  to 
the  governor's  chamber  and  inquired  what  he  [Governor 
Letcher]  would  do?  He  answered  that  he  would  back 
the  movement  then  and  issued  orders  at  once. 

"  After  a  very  short  conference  Wise  returned  to  his  seat 
in  the  Convention.  Mr.  Robert  Y.  Conrad  was  on  the 
floor,  protesting  warmly  against  the  movement,  as  un 
authorized  and  illegal,  involving,  in  fact,  all  the  conse- 
%  quences  of  treason,  and  the  whole  people  in  a  war  to 
which  the  most  of  them  were  opposed.  Mr.  John  B. 
Baldwin  and  others,  but  especially  Mr.  Baldwin,  followed 
in  a  strain  of  awful  lamentation  and  forebodings;  de 
nounced  the  act  as  a  usurpation,  as  revolutionary  and 
disturbing  to  peaceful  measures,  and  interfering  with  the 
labors  of  that  Convention  toward  compromise  and  concili 
ation.  He  asked  who  had  assumed  to  instigate  and  organ 
ize  so  rash  a  folly?  Whoever  they  were,  he  could  not,  for 
one,  sanction  or  countenance  their  disastrous  and  un- 


THE  ACTION   OF   THE   CONVENTION  279 

authorized  action.  Wise  rose  and  announced  that  he,  and 
he  alone,  had  originated  and  ordered  the  movement  and 
assumed  its  whole  responsibility;  and  he  inquired  of  Mr. 
Baldwin  whether  he  would  or  not,  now  that  the  movement 
was  on  the  march,  aid  the  people,  who  had  waited  on  the 
Convention  too  long  in  vain,  in  seizing  arms  for  their  own 
defence.  Mr.  Baldwin  said  that  he  could  not,  and  he 
hoped  the  Convention  would  not  partake  in  any  such  fear 
ful  responsibility.  It  was  not  the  act  of  the  people,  and 
those  who  had  assumed  to  act  for  the  whole  State  must, 
if  they  had  made  for  themselves  a  bloody  bed,  lie  upon  it 
and  take  all  the  consequences,  which  he  apprehended  would 
be  sad  and  fatal.  They  should  not  have  his  sanction,  or 
aid,  or  countenance.  As  yet  it  was  not  known  to  him  or 
the  Convention  of  what  portion  of  the  people  the  volun 
teers  were  composed. 

"  Wise  then  rose  and  said :  '  Mr.  President,  I  have  often 
heard  old  Augusta  1  boasted  of  as  the  heart  of  Virginia. 
Heretofore  I  have  been  content  to  acquiesce  by  silence,  in 
this  claim  of  her  preeminence  over  other  members  of  our 
body  politic,  as  a  sort  of  political  if  not  poetical  license, 
for  I  always  accorded  her  the  highest  rank  among  the 
sections  of  the  State ;  but  now  I  know,  I  feel  in  every  fibre 
of  every  extremity  of  my  body  that  she  is  the  heart  of 
Virginia.  I  feel  her  grand  and  noble  pulse  throbbing 
through  every  nerve,  and  kindling  emotions  in  my  heart 
of  admiration  and  gratitude.  Let  me  tell  the  gentleman 
from  Augusta  [Mr.  B.]  that  the  patriotic  volunteer  revo 
lutionists,  whom  he  consigns  to  bloody  beds,  are  his  constit 
uents  of  Augusta,  —  his  friends  and  neighbors  of  Staunton. 
They  are  the  men  who  are  marching  under  my  orders  to 
take  up  their  own  arms  for  their  own  defence!  The  self- 
sacrificing  Kenton  Harper  is  leading  his  neighbors  and 

1  Augusta  County  was  the  home  of  Mr.  Baldwin. 


280  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.    WISE 

command  to  all  the  dangers  and  risks  of  taking  Harper's 
Ferry,  and  the  question  is :  Shall  they  be  doomed,  unsup 
ported,  to  bloody  beds? ' 

"This  appeal  silenced  Mr.  Baldwin ;  he  looked  aghast ;  he 
dropped  his  austere  mien  of  reprehension  at  the  movement; 
and  the  whole  body  (then  in  secret  session)  was  thrown 
into  bewildering  excitement  by  Mr.  Baylor,  Baldwin's 
colleague,  rushing  by,  almost  over  seats  and  down  aisles, 
making  his  way  to  Wise.  It  might  be  to  assail  him,  but 
no;  it  was  to  grasp  his  hand,  with  tears  streaming  down 
his  cheeks,  and  exclaiming:  '  Let  me  grasp  your  hand!  I 
don't  agree  with  you,  I  don't  approve  your  acts ;  but  I  love 
you !  I  love  you ! ' ' 

On  the  eve  of  the  passage  of  the  ordinance,  it  appeared 
probable  that  a  number  of  members,  from  what  is  now 
West  Virginia,  would  retire.  A  member  of  the  Conven 
tion,  Judge  John  Critcher,  thus  describes  a  scene  in  which 
Wise  arraigned  their  leader  for  this  contemplated  with 
drawal.  "  It  was  plainly  premeditated.  Before  he  [Wise] 
arose,  I  noticed  his  suppressed  agitation.  Ex-President 
Tyler,  who  knew  what  was  coming,  turned  his  chair  about 
ten  feet  in  front  of  Wise,  with  his  back  to  the  president  of 
the  Convention.  As  Wise  proceeded  with  his  arraignment 
of  Summers,  Mr.  Tyler  lost  control  of  his  feelings  and 
tears  trickled  freely  down  his  cheeks.  The  speaker  was 
supernaturally  excited.  His  features  were  as  sharp  and 
rigid  as  bronze.  His  hair  stood  off  from  his  head,  as  if 
charged  with  electricity.  Summers  sat  on  the  left  of  the 
chair,  white  and  pale  as  the  wall  near  him.  It  was  the 
most  powerful  display  of  the  sort  I  ever  witnessed.  I 
have  heard  Wendell  Phillips,  Beecher,  Mr.  Clay,  Daniel 
O'Connell,  Lord  Brougham,  Sir  Robert  Peel,  Thiers, 
Guizot,  and  Lamartine ;  but  never  witnessed  any  display 
of  eloquence  like  this,  and  in  this  opinion  Mr.  Tyler  con- 


THE   ORDINANCE   ADOPTED  281 

curred.  I  have  often  wished  that  Wise's  remarks  could 
have  been  preserved." 

It  was  in  vain,  during  the  excited  debate  that  ensued 
in  the  secret  session,  that  the  extreme  Union  men  remon 
strated,  and  that  old  John  Janney,  of  Loudoun,  the  presi 
dent  of  the  body,  left  his  seat,  and  with  tear-dimmed  eyes 
and  a  voice  trembling  with  emotion,  pleaded  with  the  Con 
vention  not  to  sever  the  tie  that  bound  Virginia  to  the 
Federal  Government,  and  lay  bare  his  beautiful  home  to 
the  invader. 

The  adoption  of  the  ordinance  by  a  vote  of  88  to  55, 
on  the  afternoon  of  the  17th,  left  no  doubt  in  the  minds 
of  the  members  as  to  where  their  paramount  allegiance 
was  due ;  and  the  instrument  was  then,  or  later  on,  signed 
by  all  the  delegates,  with  the  exception  of  about  six  or 
eight  from  the  western  part  of  the  State.  Governor 
Letcher,  who  on  the  night  of  the  16th  had  ordered  a  se 
cession  flag  which  had  been  placed  over  the  Capitol  to  be 
hauled  down,  forthwith  took  active  steps  to  place  the  Com 
monwealth  in  a  condition  of  defence.  From  that  time 
forward  the  sentiment  of  the  people  living  within  the 
present  limits  of  Virginia  may  be  said  to  have  been  a  unit 
in  favor  of  resisting  invasion  by  the  Federal  Government. 
Political  differences  had  been  forgotten :  — 

"  Then  none  were  for  a  party, 
Then  all  were  for  the  State." 


CHAPTER  XVI 

WAR.      THE    CAMPAIGN    IN    WESTERN   VIRGINIA 

AFTER  signing  the  ordinance  of  secession,  Wise  had 
returned  to  his  farm  near  Norfolk.  His  health  had  been 
wretched  for  some  time,  and  upon  his  return  to  "  Rolles- 
ton"  he  was  confined  to  the  bed  by  sickness,  and  his  physical 
condition,  advanced  age,  and  total  lack  of  military  train 
ing  would  have  afforded  him  a  ready  excuse  for  not  en 
listing  in  the  army ;  but  he  was  not  a  man  to  fail  to 
bear  arms  in  a  conflict  which  he  had  advocated  as  neces 
sary  to  resist  the  aggressions  of  the  North.  During  the 
month  of  May  he  offered  his  services,  by  letter,  to  the 
government  formed  at  Montgomery,  Alabama,  and  was 
commissioned  a  brigadier-general  in  the  provisional  army 
of  the  Confederate  States.  As  soon  as  his  health  and 
household  affairs  permitted,  he  left  home  for  Richmond, 
to  confer  with  the  authorities  and  to  be  assigned  to  duty 
in  the  field. 

He  was  present  at  the  serenade  tendered  President  Jef 
ferson  Davis  and  family  shortly  after  the  latter's  arrival  at 
the  Spotswood  Hotel,  on  June  1,  and  in  the  course  of  a 
brief  speech  upon  that  occasion,  said,  in  alluding  to  the 
duties  and  necessities  of  the  hour :  — 

"  The  man  who  dares  to  pray,  the  man  who  dares  to 
wait  until  some  magic  arm  is  put  into  his  hand,  the  man 
who  will  not  go  unless  he  have  a  minie  or  a  percussion 

282 


WESTERN   VIRGINIA  283 

musket,  who  will  not  be  content  with  flint  and  steel,  or 
even  a  gun  without  a  lock,  is  worse  than  a  coward,  —  he 
is  a  renegade.  If  you  can  do  no  better  go  to  a  blacksmith, 
take  a  gun  along  with  you  as  a  sample,  and  get  him  to 
make  you  one  like  it.  [Get  a  spear  —  a  lance.  Take  a 
lesson  from  John  Brown.  Manufacture  your  blades  from 
old  iron,  even  though  it  be  the  tires  of  your  cart-wheels. 
Get  a  bit  of  carriage  spring,  and  grind  and  burnish  it  into 
the  shape  of  a  bowie  knife,  and  put  it  to  any  sort  of  a  han 
dle,  so  that  it  be  strong  —  ash,  hickory,  oak.  But  if  pos 
sible  get  a  double-barrelled  shot-gun  and  a  dozen  rounds 
of  buckshot,  and  go  upon  the  battle-field  with  these.  If 
the  enemy's  guns  reach  further  than  yours,  reduce  the  dis 
tance  ;  meet  them  foot  to  foot,  eye  to  eye,  body  to  body, 
and  when  you  strike  a  blow,  strike  home.  Your  true- 
blooded  Yankee  will  never  stand  still  in  the  presence  of 
cold  BteeLy 

The  importance  of  western  Virginia  to  the  Southern  cause 
was  early  perceived  by  those  in  authority ;  and  both  politi 
cal  and  strategic  reasons  rendered  it  necessary  that  a  large 
and  efficient  force  should  be  despatched  to  that  region,  in 
order  to  hold  it  for  the  Confederacy.  Enough  has  been 
said,  in  a  previous  chapter,  to  illustrate  the  lack  of  asso 
ciation  and  community  of  interest,  between  eastern  and 
western  Virginia,  to  make  it  unnecessary  to  more  than  al 
lude  to  it  again.  At  the  outbreak  of  the  Civil  War  in 
1861,  but  one  railroad  —  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio  —  trav 
ersed  the  latter  section  of  country ;  and  the  Virginia  Cen 
tral  road,  which  ran  westerly  from  Richmond,  though 
designed  to  connect  the  Chesapeake  Bay  with  the  Ohio 
River,  did  not  at  that  time  extend  beyond  Jackson's  River, 
which  is  within  the  present  limits  of  Virginia.  Thus  the 
line  of  the  Alleghanies  made  the  western  portion  of  the 
State  extremely  inaccessible  from  eastern  Virginia,  while 


284  THE  LIFE  OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

it  was  a  comparatively  easy  matter,  for  the  Federal  au 
thorities  to  throw  a  large  force  into  that  district  by  way 
of  Pennsylvania  and  Ohio.  The  presence  of  Northern 
troops  and  their  occupancy  of  the  route  afforded  by  the 
Potomac  River  left,  as  the  only  two  practicable  entrances 
into  western  Virginia  from  the  east,  the  one  by  way  of  the 
Staunton  and  Beverley  pike  and  that  of  the  James  River 
turnpike,  which  last  ran  westwardly  via  the  White  Sul 
phur  Springs  and  Lewisburg  and  over  Gauley  Bridge  into 
the  Kanawha  Valley. 

General  Robert  S.  Garnett,  a  distinguished  officer,  had 
been  ordered  to  take  command  of  the  force  sent  to  Bev 
erley  ;  and  in  response  to  an  order  received  from  General 
S.  Cooper,  the  adjutant  and  inspector-general,  issued  on 
June  6,  1861,  Wise  proceeded  to  western  Virginia,  having 
been  commissioned  to  raise  a  command  to  be  known  as  the 
"  Wise  Legion  "  and  directed  to  proceed  to  the  Kanawha 
Valley  and  to  rally  the  people  there,  to  assist  in  repelling 
the  invasion  of  that  country.  Although  he  had  never 
"set  a  squadron  in  the  field,"  and  was  entirely  without 
military  training  or  knowledge,  yet  his  selection  for  this 
post  of  duty  had  not  been  made  without  reflection  on  the 
part  of  Generals  Lee  and  Cooper. 

The  condition  of  affairs  in  the  Kanawha  Valley,  and 
indeed  throughout  western  Virginia  generally,  rendered 
it  highly  important  that  an  officer  should  be  sent  there 
having  the  confidence  of  the  people  of  that  section  in 
order  to  hold  them  with  Virginia,  instead  of  the  North. 
Wise  was,  perhaps,  better  equipped  for  this  phase  of  the 
undertaking  than  any  other  brigadier  in  the  Confederate 
service,  and  had  it  been  possible,  under  the  circumstances, 
to  accomplish  this  task,  it  is  probable  that  he  would  have 
done  so;  but  the  work  was  undertaken  too  late,  when 
the  Federal  troops  were  already  in  possession  of  impor- 


RECRUITING  THE   "WISE  LEGION"  285 

tant  points  and  when  the  Confederate  forces  were  poorly 
organized  and  equipped. 

The  order  of  General  Cooper,  directing  Wise  to  proceed 
to  the  Kanawha  Valley,  contained  among  other  informa 
tion  the  following :  "  You  must  needs  rely  upon  the  arms 
among  the  people  to  supply  the  requisite  armament,  and 
upon  their  valor  and  knowledge  of  the  country,  as  a  sub 
stitute  for  organization  and  discipline."  The  task  of  en 
listing  and  fitting  out  an  effective  force,  under  these 
conditions,  and  by  an  officer  of  no  previous  experience 
whatever,  was  far  from  being  an  easy  one  at  best ;  but  the 
difficulty  was  still  further  increased  by  the  general  dispo 
sition  of  the  inhabitants  of  western  Virginia  to  sympathize 
with  the  Federal  Government. 

On  June  the  13th  Wise  was  joined  at  Staunton  by  the 
Richmond  Light  Infantry  Blues,  a  time-honored  volunteer 
company  of  that  city,  at  that  time  under  the  command  of 
his  eldest  son,  O.  Jennings  Wise.  For  some  days  previous 
Wise  himself,  who  had  left  Richmond  without  a  man  or  a 
gun  to  accompany  him,  had  been  in  the  neighborhood  of 
Covington  and  the  adjoining  country,  beyond  Staunton, 
engaged  in  the  work  of  recruiting  for  his  regiments ;  but 
the  Blues  were  the  first  regularly  equipped  organization 
to  join  him,  and  with  them  he  proceeded  to  Jackson's 
River,  the  terminus  of  the  Virginia  Central  Railroad,  and 
from  that  point  to  Lewisburg,  the  seat  of  Greenbrier 
County,  where  he  arrived  on  the  afternoon  of  the  14th, 
and  established  a  camp.  Along  the  entire  route  the  com 
pany  had  been  enthusiastically  greeted  by  the  people,  who 
assembled  at  the  railway  stations  to  cheer  them  as  they 
passed  along ;  and  at  Goshen  the  ladies  presented  a  flag 
to  the  soldiers. 

The  work  of  recruiting  was  pushed  forward  as  rapidly 
as  conditions  permitted,  and  Wise  promptly  issued  an  ad- 


286  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.   WISE 

dress  urging  the  inhabitants  to  come  to  the  defence  of  the 
State.  On  July  8,  1861,  he  reported  the  troops  under  him 
as  numbering  about  2700  in  all.  Of  these,  some  1300 
were  organized  in  two  regiments,  in  addition  to  which 
there  were  seven  independent  companies  of  about  sixty 
men  each,  a  battalion  of  about  400,  and  three  companies  of 
mounted  rangers  numbering  170  men.  He  had  received 
valuable  assistance  in  the  work  of  recruiting  and  organiz 
ing  his  command,  from  Colonel  Christopher  Q.  Tompkins 
in  western  Virginia,  and  Colonel  J.  Lucius  Davis  who  re 
mained  in  Richmond  for  that  purpose,  at  the  time  when 
Wise  left  for  the  Kanawha  region.  Both  Tompkins  and 
Davis  were  graduates  of  West  Point  and  officers  of  merit. 
The  Legion  was  also  joined  by  several  officers,  who  had 
served  with  distinction  under  Walker  in  Nicaragua,  among 
them  Colonels  Charles  F.  Henningsen  and  Frank  Anderson, 
the  latter  having  performed  a  daring  exploit  in  the  capture 
of  Castillo,  in  that  country,  with  but  forty-eight  men.  The 
career  of  Henningsen  eclipses  that  of  Captain  John  Smith 
in  its  adventurous  character;  for  he  had  participated  in 
numerous  European  wars,  before  he  came  to  America,  as 
the  companion  and  friend  of  Kossuth.  His  marriage  to  a 
niece  of  Senator  Berrien  of  Georgia  brought  him  into  con 
tact  with  the  Southern  people,  and  he  served  first  under 
Walker  in  Nicaragua,  and  later  on  in  the  Confederate 
army. 

During  the  early  part  of  July,  Wise  advanced  into  the 
Kanawha  Valley,  by  way  of  the  Gauley  Bridge,  and  threw 
up  intrenchments  at  Tyler  Mountain,  about  five  miles  west 
of  Charleston,  which  last  place  is  located  at  the  confluence 
of  the  Elk  and  Kanawha  rivers  and  is  the  only  town  of 
importance  in  that  region. 

The  Federal  troops  selected  for  the  invasion  of  the  val 
ley,  from  the  western  entrance,  consisted  of  a  number  of 


THE  FIRST   SKIRMISH  287 

Ohio  and  Kentucky  regiments,  though  the  latter  had  been 
recruited  from  the  district  just  opposite  Cincinnati  and 
were  in  reality  Ohioan,  in  everything  except  the  name. 
The  whole  were  under  the  command  of  General  Jacob  D. 
Cox,  and  had  been  concentrated  at  Gallipolis  and  Point 
Pleasant  at  the  mouth  of  the  Kanawha,  where  it  empties 
into  the  Ohio  River.  From  the  latter  place  the  movement 
up  the  valley  was  commenced  on  the  llth  of  July,  and  the 
main  body  of  the  Federals,  under  Cox  in  person,  ascended 
the  river  in  steamers  as  far  as  navigable,  detachments  hav 
ing  been  thrown  out  on  either  bank ;  while  one  regiment 
had  been  ordered  to  proceed  from  Guyandotte,  some 
seventy  miles  below  the  mouth  of  the  Kanawha,  and  an 
other  to  land  at  Ravenswood,  about  fifty  miles  above,  and 
advance  by  way  of  Ripley.  The  total  force  commanded 
by  Cox  numbered  between  three  and  four  thousand  men, 
who  in  equipment  and  supplies  vastly  excelled  the  hastily 
organized  and  wretchedly  fitted-out  troops  under  Wise, 
many  of  whom  were  armed  with  old-fashioned  flint-lock 
muskets. 

A  detachment  of  the  Richmond  Blues  had  been  sent  on 
a  reconnoitring  expedition  to  Ripley,  and  similar  expe 
ditions  had  been  undertaken  in  various  directions;  but 
there  was  no  real  skirmishing  until  July  16,  when  two 
mounted  companies  of  Wise's  troops,  numbering  120  men 
and  commanded  by  Lieutenant-Colonel  John  Clarkson, 
encountered  a  detachment  of  200  of  the  enemy's  in 
fantry,  along  the  pike  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  Poca- 
taligo,  and  drove  them  to  the  mountain  top,  killing  eight 
and  wounding  a  number  of  others.  At  this  date  the  Con 
federates  were  posted  on  both  sides  of  the  Kanawha  as  high 
as  the  mouth  of  the  Coal  River,  which  flows  in  a  north 
westerly  direction,  and  empties  into  the  former  stream 
below  Charleston.  At  these  points,  as  well  as  on  the  Elk 


288  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.    WISE 

River  and  at  Gauley  Bridge,  Summers ville  and  on  the 
Birch  River,  Wise  had  stationed  his  men  to  await  the 
approach  of  the  enemy,  who  were  advancing  by  the  way 
of  the  Guyandotte  road  and  up  the  Kanawha.  While  the 
numerous  mountain  passes  and  beetling  cliffs  which  char 
acterize  this  section  offered  many  points  apparently  easy 
to  defend,  yet  numerous  lateral  roads  entered  the  valley 
from  every  direction,  rendering  an  attack  from  the  flank 
and  rear  highly  probable  at  any  time.  The  eastern  gate 
way  to  the  valley  was  at  Gauley  Bridge,  which  spanned 
the  river  of  that  name,  just  above  where  it  unites  with  the 
New  to  form  the  Kanawha.  It  was  necessary  that  this 
point  should  be  carefully  guarded,  as  well  as  the  road  by 
way  of  Summersville  and  Suttonsville,  across  the  Birch  and 
Powell  mountains,  which  was  the  one  subsequently  taken  by 
General  Rosecrans  to  Carnifax  Ferry ;  while  the  force  then 
operating  under  McClellan  against  Garnett  rendered  it  im 
perative  that  Wise  should  carefully  guard  against  having 
his  retreat  cut  off  at  the  eastern  end  of  the  valley.  The 
correspondence  of  McClellan  since  made  public  shows  that 
from  the  beginning  of  the  campaign  he  had  kept  this  pur 
pose  steadily  in  view,  and  in  a  letter  to  Cox,  dated  July  2, 
1861,  wrote,  "  Endeavor  to  keep  the  rebels  near  Charles 
ton  until  I  can  cut  off  their  retreat  by  movement  from 
Beverley." 

On  the  afternoon  of  July  17,  a  body  of  five  hundred  Con 
federates,  under  Major  George  S.  Patton,  encountered,  at 
Scary  Creek  below  the  Coal  River,  some  twelve  hundred 
of  the  Federal  troops  commanded  by  Colonel  Norton,  of 
the  Twenty-first,  and  Colonel  Lowe,  of  the  Twelfth  Ohio 
Infantry.  A  deep  ravine  separated  the  hostile  forces,  and 
in  the  early  part  of  the  action  the  Confederates  were  thrown 
into  some  confusion  owing  to  an  attempted  flank  move 
ment  of  the  enemy,  but  were  quickly  rallied  by  the  gallant 


THE   ENGAGEMENT   AT   SCARY  CREEK  289 

Patton,  who  unfortunately  about  this  time  was  shot  through 
the  left  shoulder  by  a  minie-ball  and  unhorsed.  This 
young  officer  was  a  distinguished  graduate  of  the  Vir 
ginia  Military  Institute  and,  at  the  commencement  of  hos 
tilities,  had  promptly  raised  a  company  for  the  defence  of 
his  native  State  ;  and  later  on,  at  the  battle  of  Winchester, 
gave  up  a  life  full  of  promise,  on  the  altar  of  his  coun 
try.  The  Federals,  by  means  of  superior  artillery,  suc 
ceeded  in  silencing  two  iron  sixes  opposed  to  them,  but 
the  infantry  of  the  Confederates  were  well  handled  by 
Captain  Jenkins,  upon  whom  the  command  devolved  after 
the  wounding  of  Pattoii.  After  a  sharp  engagement  the 
Federals  were  handsomely  repulsed,  about  thirty  of  them 
having  been  killed  and  a  number  taken  prisoners,  among 
whom  were  Colonels  Norton,  Woodruff,  De  Villiers, 
Lieutenant-Colonel  Neff,  and  Captains  Austin  and  Ward. 
The  retreating  columns  were  pressed  for  some  distance, 
but  were  able  to  cross  to  the  north  side  of  the  Kanawha 
and  encamped  near  the  mouth  of  the  Pocataligo  River. 
Wise  immediately  resolved  to  follow  up  the  victory  gained 
at  Scary  Creek,  and  advanced  that  night  with  three  troops 
of  cavalry  and  650  infantry  and  artillery;  but  finding  three 
regiments  of  the  enemy  strongly  intrenched  behind  the 
Pocataligo,  and  provided  with  adequate  artillery,  and  be 
ing  without  such  pieces  himself,  abandoned  the  idea  of 
attack. 

Events  were  now  transpiring  elsewhere  which  necessi 
tated  the  latter 's  withdrawal  from  the  Kanawha  region. 
The  disastrous  retreat  of  General  Garnett's  command, 
after  his  defeat  at  Rich  Mountain,  rendered  it  highly 
perilous  for  Wise  to  remain  where  he  was,  with  Cox  in  his 
front;  for  he  was  in  imminent  danger  of  being  attacked 
from  the  rear  by  McClellan  and  having  his  command 
crushed  between  these  two  armies.  In  obedience  to  orders 


290  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY  A.    WISE 

received  from  General  Cooper  at  Richmond,  he  fell  back 
from  Charleston  on  the  24th  of  July,  and  on  the  27th 
crossed  the  Gauley  River,  burning  the  bridge  there  behind 
him,  which  act  was  rendered  necessary  owing  to  his  defi 
ciency  in  means  of  transportation. 

Except  to  fell  a  few  trees  here  and  there,  nothing  had 
been  done  to  prevent  the  prompt  occupation  of  the  upper 
end  of  the  valley  by  Cox,  who  had  advanced  as  far  as 
Charleston  the  day  after  Wise  retired ;  and  later,  on  the 
29th  of  July,  had  taken  possession  of  Gauley  Bridge, 
about  thirty-eight  miles  distant,  at  which  place  he  accu 
mulated  supplies,  determined,  as  he  states,  to  stand  a  siege 
if  necessary.  The  retreat  from  the  Kanawha  Valley,  by 
the  force  under  Wise,  had  been  made  in  good  order  and 
without  serious  loss.  Within  half  an  hour,  however,  after 
he  had  fallen  back  from  Tyler  Mountain,  the  enemy  took 
possession  and  nearly  succeeded  in  cutting  off  a  regiment 
composed  of  about  seven  hundred  State  volunteers,  under 
Colonel  Tompkins,  at  Coal  River.  The  latter  succeeded 
in  making  good  their  escape,  though  they  were  compelled 
to  abandon  and  fire  the  steamer  Maffet,  in  which  they  were 
moving  up  the  Kanawha,  which  stream  was  navigable  to  a 
point  some  ten  miles  above  Charleston. 

From  the  Gauley  Bridge,  Wise  had  proceeded  along  the 
James  River  turnpike  to  the  White  Sulphur  Springs,  about 
seventy  miles  eastward,  and  not  far  from  the  town  of 
Lewisburg.  It  was  at  that  time  apprehended  that  the 
enemy,  who  it  was  evident  would  form  a  line  of  communi 
cations  between  Weston  and  Gauley  Bridge,  would  ad 
vance  by  way  of  Lewisburg,  with  the  object  of  threatening 
either  the  Southwestern,  or  the  Virginia  Central  Railroad, 
and  it  was,  therefore,  deemed  advisable  to  make  a  stand  in 
the  vicinity  of  the  last-named  town,  until  a  union  between 
Wise's  force  and  that  of  Floyd,  or  Loring,  could  be  ef- 


CONDITION   OF   THE   TROOPS  291 

fected.  It  was,  moreover,  in  a  high  degree  imperative  that 
Wise  should  without  further  delay  refit  and  reorganize 
his  wretchedly  equipped  force,  who  were  sadly  deficient  in 
blankets,  clothing,  arms,  ammunition,  and  means  of  trans 
portation,  and  were  without  tents  and,  in  many  instances, 
shoes  to  their  feet.  A  fairly  accurate  idea  of  the  condi 
tion  of  the  force  can  be  had  from  the  subsequent  report  of 
Wise  to  the  War  Department,  in  which  he  says :  "It  was 
a  secret  which  neither  of  us  [Colonel  Tompkins  and  him 
self]  dared  to  tell  in  the  Kanawha  Valley,  that  at  no  time 
of  the  whole  sixty  days  while  we  were  marching  and 
countermarching,  posting  and  counterposting,  scouting 
and  fighting,  day  in  and  day  out,  in  a  valley  the  hardest 
to  defend  and  the  easiest  to  be  attacked  in  the  topography 
of  the  country,  could  we  at  any  time  have  fired  in  any 
general  action  ten  rounds  of  ammunition  in  our  joint 
commands." 

The  already  miserable  condition  of  his  troops  was  to  be 
still  further  increased,  while  at  the  White  Sulphur,  by  an 
epidemic  of  measles,  which  raged  among  them  to  such  an 
extent  that,  at  one  time,  their  number  of  effective  men 
was  reduced  nearly  fifty  per  cent. 

On  the  5th  of  August,  Wise  was  joined  at  the  Springs 
by  General  John  B.  Floyd,  commanding  a  brigade  which 
he  had  raised  mostly  in  the  southwestern  part  of  the 
State,  having  been  early  commissioned  as  a  brigadier- 
general  in  the  Confederate  service,  and  who,  on  account 
of  the  date  of  his  commission,  was  Wise's  senior  in  rank. 
Floyd  promptly  determined  to  move  into  the  Kanawha 
Valley,  against  the  enemy,  of  which  plan  of  campaign 
Wise  did  not  approve.  In  his  opinion,  it  was  the  better 
policy  to  draw  the  enemy  to  the  eastern  verge  of  the  wild 
mountainous  country  lying  this  side  of  the  Gauley,  and 
known  as  the  Fayette  Wilderness,  thereby  forcing  upon 


292  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.   WISE 

them  some  forty  miles  of  wagon  transportation,  away  from 
their  base  of  supplies,  rather  than  that  the  commands  of 
Floyd  and  himself  should  penetrate  the  district,  and  have 
themselves  to  undertake  this  hauling  and  marching  over 
mountain  roads.  From  the  outset  of  the  campaign  there 
appears  to  have  been  a  lack  of  harmony  between  Floyd 
and  Wise,  and  the  latter  had  applied  to  General  Lee  to 
separate  his  legion  from  that  of  Floyd,  it  having  been 
originally  intended  as  an  independent  partisan  force ;  this, 
however,  General  Lee  declined  to  do,  and  urged  the  neces 
sity  of  united  action. 

On  the  13th  of  August,  General  Floyd,  who  was  then  at 
Meadow  Bluff,  and  had  assumed  command  of  all  the  forces 
intended  to  operate  against  the  Kanawha  Valley,  ordered 
Wise  to  join  him  with  his  troops ;  but  owing  to  lack  of 
supplies  and  transportation,  and  the  sickness  among  the 
men,  which  had  largely  unfitted  them  for  service,  it  was 
not  until  the  16th  that  Wise  marched  to  Big  Sewell  Moun 
tain  with  his  first  and  second  regiments,  leaving  his  third 
regiment,  then  not  in  marching  order,  and  a  regiment  of 
State  volunteers  under  Colonel  Tompkins,  in  need  of  re 
fitting,  to  follow  as  soon  as  possible. 

On  the  19th,  Wise  was  ordered  by  Floyd  to  proceed 
with  his  force,  on  the  day  following,  along  the  turnpike 
from  Sewell  Mountain  in  the  direction  of  the  Kanawha, 
and  in  response  to  this  command  advanced  about  fifteen 
miles  in  the  neighborhood  of  the  Sunday  road  leading  to 
Carnifax  Ferry.  Here  his  scouts  reported  that  they  had 
been  fired  upon,  and  Lieutenant-Colonel  Croghan,  who  had 
been  sent  forward  along  the  James  River  turnpike  with  a 
detachment  of  cavalry,  had  a  skirmish  with  the  enemy  near 
Piggott's  Mill,  and  another  in  the  vicinity  of  the  Hawk's 
Nest,  about  six  miles  east  of  Gauley  Bridge,  where  he 
encountered  a  considerable  force,  and  was  obliged  to  retire. 


THE   BATTLE   OF    CARNIFAX  FERRY  293 

On  the  evening  of  the  21st,  the  commands  of  Floyd  and 
Wise  were  united  at  the  foot  of  Gauley  Mountain,  and 
after  a  conference  between  the  two  brigade  commanders, 
it  was  decided  that  Wise  should  proceed,  at  three  o'clock 
in  the  morning,  to  attack  the  enemy  at  Carnifax  Ferry,  on 
Gauley  River,  some  twenty  miles  above  where  it  unites 
with  the  New  to  form  the  Kanawha.  Floyd,  in  the  mean 
while,  was  to  hold  the  front  on  the  turnpike,  and  join  Wise 
at  the  ferry,  after  covering  the  train  and  artillery  which 
had  been  left  at  Dogwood  Gap.  The  movement  was 
promptly  executed  by  Wise,  who  left  Piggott's  Mill  at 
3.30  o'clock  in  the  morning,  and,  after  a  seventeen-mile 
march  through  mud  ankle-deep,  found  that  the  enemy 
had  crossed  the  river,  having  first  destroyed  one  of  the 
two  ferry-boats,  and  sent  the  other  adrift  over  the  falls. 
Shortly  after  Wise's  arrival  at  the  south  of  the  ferry,  Floyd, 
who  had  been  informed  during  the  night  that  the  force 
of  the  enemy  stationed  at  this  point  had  marched  to  the 
mouth  of  the  Gauley,  made  a  forced  march,  by  a  shorter 
route  than  the  one  taken  by  Wise,  without  notifying  him, 
and  came  up  with  him  early  on  the  morning  of  the  22d 
instant.  Having  joined  to  his  command  three  pieces  of 
artillery,  a  detachment  for  the  guns,  and  one  hundred 
horse  belonging  to  Wise,  Floyd  crossed  the  Gauley  by 
means  of  the  sunken  ferry-boat,  and  ordered  Wise,  with 
the  remainder  of  the  latter's  command,  back  to  take  posi 
tion  on  the  turnpike  to  check  the  enemy. 

On  the  25th  of  August,  Floyd,  becoming  aware  that  the 
Seventh  Ohio  Regiment,  under  Colonel  E.  B.  Tyler,  was 
approaching  the  direction  of  the  ferry,  having  been  de 
spatched  thither  by  Rosecrans,  determined  to  attack,  and 
ordered  Wise  to  send  one  of  his  regiments  to  support  him. 
Although  the  command  of  Wise  was  barely  sufficient,  as 
he  states,  to  hold  the  turnpike  road,  yet  he  had  prepared 


294  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.    WISE 

to  reen force  Floyd  on  the  morning  of  Sunday,  the  25th, 
when  firing  was  heard  in  the  direction  of  Piggott's  Mill, 
near  the  foot  of  the  Saturday  road  leading  to  Carnifax 
from  the  James  River  pike,  and  some  fugitive  cavalrymen 
coming  in  reported  the  advance  of  the  enemy.  At  that 
time  the  force  of  the  latter  under  Cox  consisted  of  two 
regiments  at  Gauley  Bridge,  another  along  the  Kanawha 
to  cover  the  steamboat  communications,  while  an  advance 
guard  of  some  eight  companies  was  thrown  forward 
along  the  turnpike,  between  the  Bridge  and  the  Hawk's 
Nest,  where  the  roadway  passes  through  a  series  of  narrow 
defiles.  A  small  body  of  Floyd's  cavalry  had  imprudently 
advanced  into  the  passes  beyond  Piggott's  Mill  and  had 
narrowly  escaped  capture.  Wise  immediately  started  a 
force  of  infantry  and  three  artillery  pieces  on  a  double- 
quick  march,  which  caused  the  enemy  to  fall  back  in  the 
vicinity  of  the  Hawk's  Nest.  About  sunrise  on  the  morn 
ing  of  the  26th,  Floyd  with  his  own  force  and  the  two 
volunteer  regiments  under  Tompkins  and  McCausland, 
which  had  been  detached  from  Wise,  fell  upon  Tyler,  who 
had  advanced  as  far  as  Cross  Lanes,  within  two  miles  of 
the  Confederate  camp,  and  dispersed  his  regiment,  which 
was  completely  taken  by  surprise.  The  enemy  lost  some 
twenty  or  more  killed  and  one  hundred  captured.  Floyd, 
who  remained  on  the  north  side  of  the  Gauley,  was  now 
on  the  line  of  communication  between  Rosecrans  and 
Cox,  the  former  having  established  a  chain  of  posts  from 
Weston  by  way  of  Suttonsville,  with  a  considerable  force 
at  each,  prepared  to  unite  with  Cox  at  Gauley  Bridge. 
Anticipating  an  attack,  on  the  31st,  Floyd  wrote  Wise 
to  further  reenforce  him ;  but  owing  to  sickness  and  want 
of  forage  for  the  cavalry,  the  available  force  under  the 
latter's  command  had  been  reduced  to  scarcely  eighteen 
hundred  effective  men,  with  which  he  had  to  guard  the 


THE  BATTLE   OF   CARNIFAX   FERRY  295 

turnpike  in  front  of  Cox,  as  well  as  watch  the  approaches 
from  the  south  side  of  the  New  River.  This  caused  him 
to  address  a  reply  to  Floyd,  explaining  the  situation,  and 
asking  a  reconsideration  of  this  command ;  but  receiving  a 
second  order  late  in  the  day,  stating  that  the  enemy  was 
advancing,  Wise  moved  to  Carnifax,  leaving  only  a  small 
guard  at  Dogwood  Gap.  Upon  arriving  at  the  cliffs  over 
looking  the  ferry,  another  communication  from  General 
Floyd  was  delivered  to  him,  in  which  the  latter  stated 
that  from  more  recent  information  he  did  not  consider  a 
union  of  their  forces  necessary  at  that  time,  and  ordered 
him  back  to  Dogwood  Gap,  whither  Wise  marched  during 
the  afternoon.  His  men  were  weary  from  their  march,  but 
Wise  announced  to  them  his  intention  to  take  the  Hawk's 
Nest  on  the  following  day,  in  order,  as  he  states,  that  he 
might  gain  possession  of  Liken's  mill  to  grind  wheat  and 
corn  for  his  troops,  and  also  secure  the  approaches  to 
Miller's  ferry,  leading  across  the  New  River,  which  would 
enable  him  to  communicate  with  the  volunteer  troops 
under  General  Chapman,  on  the  south  side  of  that  stream. 
On  the  2d  of  September,  Wise  marched  from  Dogwood 
Gap  to  Hamilton's,  within  a  half-mile  of  the  Hawk's  Nest, 
from  which  place  he  advanced  along  the  pike,  driving  the 
enemy  beyond  Big  Creek,  a  distance  of  some  thirteen 
miles ;  but  the  latter  being  reenforced,  Wise  fell  back  to 
Hamilton's  and  encamped  there  and  at  Westlake's  Creek, 
guarding  the  ferry.  From  this  time  until  September  the 
10th,  the  date  of  the  battle  of  Carnifax  Ferry,  the  position 
of  Floyd  and  Wise  continued  practically  unchanged,  the 
former  remaining  north  of  the  Gauley  and  the  latter  hold 
ing  his  position  on  the  turnpike  in  the  vicinity  of  the 
Hawk's  Nest,  in  front  of  Cox.  Reports  reached  Floyd  on 
the  9th  of  the  approach  of  Rosecrans,  who  was  marching 
with  three  brigades  from  Clarksburg,  apparently  either  to 


296  THE  LIFE  OF   HENRY  A.    WISE 

join  Cox  at  Gauley  Bridge,  or  to  attack  the  Confederate 
force  at  Carnifax  Ferry.  This  caused  Floyd  in  turn  to 
order  Wise  to  send  troops  to  his  support,  and  the  regiment 
under  Colonel  Tompkins  was  immediately  despatched, 
in  response  to  this  message,  though  it  had  been  sent  to 
Wise  but  two  days  previously  as  the  result  of  an  urgent 
demand  from  him.  The  further  order  of  Floyd,  that 
Wise  send  him  one  thousand  men  from  his  legion,  the 
latter  was  obliged  to  decline  to  comply  with;  as,  owing  to 
sickness  and  other  causes,  his  effective  infantry  had  been 
reduced  to  about  twelve  hundred,  and  artillery  to  two 
hundred,  while  six  out  of  eight  companies  of  cavalry  had 
been  sent  over  New  River  to  Loop  Creek  and  Coal  River. 
About  the  hour  of  noon  on  the  10th,  Wise  received  a 
communication  from  Floyd,  inquiring  why  his  order  of 
the  previous  day  had  not  been  complied  with,  and  per 
emptorily  ordering  the  former  to  send  one  thousand 
infantry  and  a  battery  of  artillery  with  all  possible  speed. 
To  this  last  Wise  answered  from  Hamilton's,  near  the 
Hawk's  Nest:  "Mr.  Carr  has  just  handed  me  yours  of 
to-day  at  12.05  M.  It  found  me  here,  called  to  meet  an 
advance  of  the  enemy,  who  are  reported  to  threaten  my 
picket  at  the  Hawk's  Nest,  and  all  my  force  of  three  regi 
ments  of  infantry,  a  corps  of  artillery,  and  two  companies 
of  cavalry  are  under  arms,  to  prevent,  if  possible,  an 
obvious  attempt  to  turn  our  right  flank  and  pass  us  at  the 
turnpike,  most  probably  to  gain  Carnifax  Ferry  in  your 
rear.  Under  these  circumstances  I  shall,  upon  my  legiti 
mate  responsibility,  exercise  a  sound  discretion  whether  to 
obey  your  very  peremptory  orders  of  to-day,  or  not." 

Floyd  had  thrown  up  temporary  intrenchments  near 
Carnifax,  in  a  position  that  was  sheltered  by  woods  and 
undergrowth  from  the  enemy's  view.  Rosecrans,  who 
had  proceeded  by  the  way  of  Summersville  and  had  that 


THE   BATTLE   OF   CARNIFAX   FERRY  297 

day  marched  seventeen  and  a  half  miles,  with  three  bri 
gades  of  his  troops,  began  a  reconnoissance  of  Floyd's  posi 
tion  about  three  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  and  a  spirited 
engagement  was  commenced  which  lasted  until  nightfall. 
The  Federal  forces  and  especially  the  Tenth  and  Thir 
teenth  Ohio  regiments,  the  former  under  Colonel  William 
H.  Lytle,  and  the  latter  commanded  by  Colonel  William  S. 
Smith,  assaulted  as  vigorously  as  the  nature  of  the  ground 
would  permit,  but  were  repulsed  by  Floyd,  whose  men 
behaved  with  coolness  and  courage.  The  Federal  casual- 
ities  amounted  to  17  killed  and  141  wounded,  while  Floyd's 
loss  was  inconsiderable. 

At  eight  P.M.  on  the  night  of  the  engagement  at  Carni- 
fax,  Floyd  despatched  an  order  to  Wise  to  re  enforce 
him  with  all  the  latter's  troops  save  one  regiment,  which 
message  was  received  after  the  hour  of  midnight ;  but  on 
the  morning  of  the  llth  Wise  advanced  toward  Carnifax, 
and  when  about  halfway  to  the  ferry  received  verbal 
orders  to  return  to  Dogwood  Gap.  During  the  night  of 
the  engagement  Floyd,  on  account  of  his  precarious  posi 
tion  and  the  superior  force  with  which  he  was  confronted, 
had  determined  to  withdraw  his  command  to  the  south 
side  of  the  Gauley,  which  was  successfully  done  under 
the  cover  of  darkness.  The  movements  of  both  Floyd  and 
Wise  have  been  here  described  with  what  would  appear 
to  be  unnecessary  detail,  but  the  latter  has  been  so  fre 
quently  censured  for  his  conduct  during  the  campaign, 
and  for  his  alleged  failure  to  support  the  former  at  Carni 
fax  Ferry,  that  we  have  thought  best  to  give  the  actual 
occurrences  as  reported  in  the  volumes  of  war  records. 

Floyd  had  been  commissioned  a  brigadier  in  the  Con 
federate  service  prior  to  Wise,  and,  as  his  ranking  officer, 
it  was  undoubtedly  the  duty  of  the  latter  to  render  prompt 
obedience  to  his  orders.  That  he  assumed  the  responsi- 


298  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

bility  of  declining  to  do  this,  on  the  date  of  the  Carnifax 
engagement,  is  true,  yet  when  we  consider  his  situation 
at  the  time  of  the  receipt  of  this  order,  the  circumstances 
would  seem  to  indicate  that  his  action  was  dictated  by 
sound  judgment.  Cox  had  thrown  forward  a  consider 
able  force  along  the  James  River  pike  east  of  Gauley 
Bridge,  which  troops  Wise  was  at  this  time  engaged  in 
holding  in  check.  From  a  point  on  the  pike  eleven  miles 
east  of  Gauley  Bridge  the  Saturday  road  leads  to  Carnifax 
Ferry,  and  five  miles  further  on  the  Sunday  road  enters 
the  pike  from  the  same  place.  By  either  of  these  roads 
Cox  could  easily  have  moved  up  to  Floyd's  rear,  on  the 
south  side  of  the  Gauley,  entirely  cutting  off  his  retreat 
and  rendering  his  capture  well-nigh  inevitable.  The  offi 
cial  report  of  General  Rosecrans  shows  that  Cox  had  been 
instructed  to  operate  in  the  direction  of  Floyd,  and  Wise 
was  correct  in  believing  that  Cox  had  conceived  the  plan 
of  advancing  by  the  Saturday  or  Sunday  road.  The 
Gauley  River,  in  the  vicinity  of  Carnifax,  penetrates  a 
deep,  mountainous  gorge,  with  a  continuous  fall  for  a  dis 
tance  of  twelve  or  fifteen  miles. 

The  descent  to  the  ferry  from  the  north  side  is  described 
by  General  Rosecrans  as  "  by  a  narrow  wagon-track,  wind 
ing  around  a  rocky  hillside.  The  ascent  from  the  other 
side  is  by  a  road  passing  up  the  Meadow  River,  which  is 
in  a  deep  rocky  gorge,  the  bottom  being  little  wider  than 
the  bed  of  the  river,  and  the  side  ascending  precipitously 
to  the  height  of  nearly  three  hundred  feet.  For  two  miles 
the  road  gradually  ascends  until  it  reaches  the  top  of  the 
hill,  when  the  country  becomes  high,  rolling,  and  partially 
cultivated." 

In  a  lengthy  report,  addressed  to  the  Hon.  Judah  P. 
Benjamin,  the  Secretary  of  War  for  the  Confederate 
States,  Wise  wrote  as  follows  in  reference  to  the  crossing 


REPORT   TO   THE   SECRETARY   OF   WAR  299 

of  the  Gauley  at  Carnifax :  "  From  the  first  mention  of 
the  occupation  at  Carnifax  Ferry,  I  urged  upon  General 
Floyd  the  importance  of  that  ferry,  as  commanding  the 
stem  of  all  the  roads  to  the  rear  on  the  turnpike.  To  this 
end  we  could  hold  it  on  the  left  bank  or  south  side  of 
Gauley  with  a  very  small  force,  say  250  men,  if  their  rear 
were  well  covered,  so  as  to  prevent  the  approach  of  the 
enemy  toward  them  from  the  turnpike.  By  holding  that 
stem  and  advancing  our  forces  to  the  foot  of  the  Saturday 
road,  and  to  where  the  Chestnutburg  road  enters  the 
turnpike  (the  mouths  of  the  Saturday  and  Chestnutburg 
roads  being  near  each  other  on  opposite  sides),  we  could 
have  forced  the  enemy  to  approach  on  the  turnpike  alone 
in  single  column  and  could  have  met  him  with  our  concen 
trated  defences,  without  much  danger  of  having  our  flanks 
turned.  It  was  utterly  unmilitary  to  have  crossed  Carni 
fax  Ferry,  unless  General  Floyd  had  force  enough  to 
advance.  I  warned  him  that  this  would  compel  him  to 
divide  his  command,  already  too  weak  when  combined; 
that  if  he  crossed,  the  enemy  might  advance  upon  him 
from  Summers ville,  from  Gauley  Bridge  up  the  Gauley, 
and  from  Gauley  Bridge  up  the  Saturday  road,  thus 
attacking  him  with  superior  numbers  front,  flank,  and 
rear.  Whilst  he  would  be  too  weak  to  withstand  the 
front  and  flank  attack  on  the  right  bank  of  the  Gauley, 
I  would  be  too  weak,  perhaps,  to  prevent  the  enemy  from 
falling  on  his  rear  on  the  left  bank  of  the  Gauley ;  that 
his  ferriage,  too,  was  insufficient  for  the  retreat  of  his 
command;  whereas,  if  we  took  the  position  I  advised, 
we  would  hold  Miller's  ferry  also,  on  the  New  River,  and 
could  spur  the  enemy  at  Cotton  Hill,  Montgomery's  ferry, 
at  the  Loop  and  from  Coal  River,  all  the  way  down  the 
left  bank  of  the  Kanawha,  and  compel  the  enemy  to  with 
draw  a  considerable  portion  of  his  force  from  Gauley 


300  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

Bridge ;  that  as  long  as  he  insisted  on  crossing  that  ferry 
and  thus  exposing  himself,  it  would  be  impossible  for  me 
to  reenforce  him  from  across  the  river,  without  exposing 
the  safety  of  both  commands  to  the  same  disaster  of  hav 
ing  our  retreat  cut  off." 

On  the  evening  of  the  12th  of  September,  a  conference 
was  held  between  Floyd  and  Wise  at  the  former's  camp, 
as  a  result  of  which  orders  were  issued  to  fall  back  to  the 
top  of  Big  Sewell  Mountain,  about  seventeen  miles  east 
of  Dogwood  Gap,  and  thirty-two  miles  from  Gauley 
Bridge.  In  accordance  with  the  above,  the  commands 
retreated  to  Sewell  Mountain,  with  the  exception  of  six 
companies  of  Wise's  cavalry,  numbering  240  men  in  all, 
under  Colonel  J.  Lucius  Davis,  who  had  made  a  success 
ful  raid  on  the  south  bank  of  the  Kanawha,  to  within 
a  few  miles  of  Charleston,  and  had  successfully  repulsed 
a  detachment  of  the  enemy  on  the  12th  of  September. 
The  joint  commands  of  Floyd  and  Wise  reached  Big 
Sewell  on  the  14th,  the  former  encamping  on  the  summit 
of  that  mountain,  while  the  latter  selected  a  position  on 
the  eastern  slope,  or  what  is  known  as  Little  Sewell,  at  the 
place  afterward  called  Camp  Defiance,  and  which  is  said 
to  have  been  one  of  the  strongest  points  between  the 
Alleghanies  and  the  Ohio.  On  the  15th  and  16th  Floyd 
was  engaged  in  throwing  up  earthworks  on  the  Big  Sewell, 
but  suddenly  determining  that  his  position  was  not  a 
tenable  one,  owing  to  its  exposed  character,  retreated  on 
the  night  of  the  16th,  with  about  three  thousand  men, 
to  Meadow  Bluff,  in  the  direction  of  Lewisburg.  Wise 
was  without  suitable  wagon  trains  to  follow  up  Floyd's 
retreat,  without  abandoning  valuable  provisions,  and  this, 
together  with  the  wet  weather  and  the  dissatisfaction 
among  the  troops  at  the  idea  of  retiring  farther  in  the  face 
of  the  enemy,  caused  him  to  resolve  to  make  a  stand  on 


THE   STAND    ON   LITTLE   SEWELL  301 

Little  Sewell,  and  to  disregard  the  order  of  Floyd  to  pre 
pare  to  bring  up  the  latter's  rear.  "  Here,"  wrote  Colonel 
Henningsen,  "it  was  impossible  for  an  enemy  to  bring 
more  than  two  guns  or  a  thousand  men  to  bear  on  any 
part  of  his  position;  and  on  every  point,  within  a  few 
minutes,  General  Wise  could  bring  six  of  his  eight  pieces 
and  two -thirds  of  his  force  into  play,  besides  the  advan 
tage  of  intrenchments.  In  addition,  most  of  the  officers 
of  the  Legion  spoke  openly  of  resigning  if  compelled  to 
retreat  any  further.  On  the  18th,  General  Wise  addressed 
the  troops  of  his  Legion,  stating  substantially  that  hitherto 
he  had  never  retreated  but  in  obedience  to  superior  orders. 
That  here  he  was  determined  to  make  a  stand.  That  his 
force  consisted  only  of  seventeen  hundred  infantry  and 
artillery,  and  that  the  enemy  was  alleged  to  be  fifteen 
thousand  strong.  That  this  he  did  not  believe,  but  that 
his  men  must  be  prepared  to  fight  two  or  three  or  several 
to  one,  and  even  if  the  enemy  were  in  the  full  force  stated, 
the  position  admitted  of  successful  defence  and  he  was 
determined  to  abide  the  issue.  He  warned  them  that 
they  would  probably  be  attacked  front  and  rear  for  suc 
cessive  days,  and  he  called  on  any  officer  or  soldier  who 
felt  doubtful  of  the  result,  or  unwilling  to  stand  by  him 
in  this  trail,  to  step  forward,  promising  that  they  should 
be  marched  at  once  to  Meadow  Bluff.  This  speech, 
delivered  successively  to  the  three  regiments  of  infantry 
and  to  the  artillery,  was  received  with  the  wildest  enthu 
siasm.  Not  one  solitary  individual  in  the  Legion  failed 
to  respond,  and  the  spirits  of  the  corps  were  raised  and 
maintained  at  the  highest  fighting  pitch.  The  provisions 
and  baggage  wagons  were  withdrawn  into  safe  positions 
and  the  camp  on  all  sides  strengthened.  In  this  attitude 
the  Legion  remained  till  about  the  20th,  when  it  was 
strengthened  by  the  arrival  of  Captain  Romer's  artillery 


302  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

company,  with  one  gun,  and  one  Virginia,  one  North 
Carolina,  and  three  Georgia  companies,  which  swelled 
the  forces  of  the  Wise  Legion  to  over  two  thousand  men." 

On  the  21st  of  September,  General  Lee,  who  had  joined 
Floyd  at  Meadow  Bluff,  wrote  to  Wise  urging  the  union 
of  the  latter's  troops  with  those  of  the  former.  In  his 
letter  Lee  expressed  the  opinion  that  Floyd's  position  had 
the  advantage  over  that  at  Little  Sewell,  in  that  it  com 
manded  the  Wilderness  road  and  the  approach  to  Lewis- 
burg,  which  he  thought  the  aim  of  Rosecrans.  Wise  in 
his  reply  expressed  his  willingness  to  unite  with  Floyd,  at 
whatever  point  might  be  thought  best,  but  requested  Gen 
eral  Lee  to  examine  his  position  at  Little  Sewell  before 
ordering  him  back  to  Meadow  Bluff.  In  addition,  Wise 
pointed  out  that  it  was  improbable  that  the  enemy  would 
advance  by  the  Wilderness  road  instead  of  the  turnpike ; 
and  he  estimated  their  number  at  about  seven  thousand  men, 
whom  he  thought  the  joint  forces  of  Floyd  and  himself  amply 
able  to  check  at  Little  Sewell.  General  Lee  rode  over  to 
Wise's  camp  the  following  day,  and  after  inspecting  his 
position,  directed  him  to  hold  it  until  further  orders.  The 
peculiar  formation  of  Little  Sewell  prevented  the  possibil 
ity  of  a  flank  movement,  as  any  attack  there  had  to  be 
made  directly  in  front,  up  a  narrow  gorge,  between  pre 
cipitous  mountain  sides.  The  surface  of  Big  Sewell,  on 
the  other  hand,  was  a  large  flat  area  exposed  on  the  sides. 

The  site  of  Floyd's  camp,  twelve  miles  to  the  eastward 
at  Meadow  Bluff,  beyond  the  fact  that  it  covered  the 
approaches  to  Lewisburg,  possessed  no  natural  advantage 
whatever  and  his  earthworks  had  been  constructed  in  a  low- 
lying  field,  where  they  were  inundated  by  the  first  rainfall. 

On  the  afternoon  of  the  23d,  the  enemy  appeared, 
and  began  driving  in  the  Confederate  pickets.  Wise 
promptly  notified  General  Lee  at  Meadow  Bluff,  who 


RETURN   TO   RICHMOND  303 

does  not  appear  to  have  at  first  credited  the  report  that 
the  enemy  were  advancing  in  full  force,  and  it  was  not 
until  the  afternoon  of  the  24th  that  Lee,  in  response  to 
further  information  from  Wise,  arrived  at  Little  Sewell 
with  a  reenforcement  of  four  regiments.  "  By  this  time," 
wrote  Wise,  "the  enemy  had  received  reinforcements 
swelling  their  numbers  probably  to  more  than  six  thou 
sand,  and  their  scouts  pushed  close  to  our  lines,  occasioning 
frequent  sharp  skirmishes,  in  all  of  which  our  men  and 
officers  acquitted  themselves  to  my  entire  satisfaction." 

On  the  afternoon  of  the  25th,  while  under  fire  on  the 
field,  Wise  received  an  order  from  the  President  to  trans 
fer  his  command  to  Floyd  and  report  at  Richmond,  and 
the  following  morning  set  out  for  that  place,  where  he 
arrived  two  days  later.  The  severe  exposure  to  which  he 
had  been  subjected  for  months,  in  a  mountain  country 
during  a  rainy  season,  brought  on  an  illness,  which  con 
fined  him  to  his  bed  for  some  weeks.  After  regaining  his 
strength  he  submitted  his  report  to  the  War  Department, 
detailing  his  movements  in  western  Virginia.  The  cam 
paign  in  that  section  had  not  been  a  successful  one  and 
Wise  had  failed  to  meet  the  expectations  of  his  admirers. 
More  than  one  circumstance  had  made  against  Confed 
erate  success  beyond  the  Alleghanies,  and  General  Lee 
himself  was  destined  to  return  to  Richmond  later  on  with 
greatly  diminished  reputation.  It  can  hardly  be  said  that 
the  assignment  of  either  Floyd  or  Wise  to  command  in  the 
Kanawha  region  was  dictated  by  the  soundest  judgment, 
and  political  motives  doubtless  largely  controlled  in  their 
selection.  Wise  had  been  too  long  in  public  life  to  divest 
himself  of  his  former  habits  all  at  once,  and  his  letters 
during  this  period  often  suggest  characteristics  begotten 
by  campaigning  of  another  sort.  His  excitable  temper 
and  apparent  lack  of  appreciation  of  the  prompt  obedience 


304  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

required  of  a  soldier  by  his  superiors  in  command  were, 
doubtless,  a  source  of  frequent  annoyance  and  embarrass 
ment  to  both  Generals  Lee  and  Floyd;  yet  it  is  idle  to 
endeavor,  as  some  Southern  writers  have  attempted,  to 
fasten  the  failure  of  the  western  Virginia  expedition  upon 
him.  The  true  reasons  for  this  failure  are  to  be  found  in 
a  variety  of  unfavorable  conditions,  rather  than  in  the 
faults  of  any  one  officer.  The  Federals  had  been  much 
more  prompt  than  the  Confederates  in  occupying  this 
territory,  which  was  far  more  accessible  to  them;  and 
after  the  defeat  of  Garnett  by  McClellan,  the  real  key  to 
the  Kanawha  Valley  was  lost  to  the  South.  Had  the 
force  under  the  last-named  officer  been  held  at  bay,  the 
Confederates  could  without  much  difficulty  have  retained 
control  of  that  valley  as  far  westward  as  the  Ohio  ;  and  it 
is  probable  that  a  considerable  number  of  its  inhabitants 
would  have  enlisted  in  the  Southern  army. 

Throughout  the  campaign  Wise  had  retained  unabated 
the  confidence  of  the  troops  under  his  command,  and  if  he 
was  deficient  in  military  training,  he  did  not  lack  true 
courage,  or  the  faculty  of  inspiring  his  men  with  zeal  for 
the  cause  in  which  they  were  engaged,  under  circumstances 
the  most  trying.  One  other  talent  of  the  military  leader 
he  possessed  in  more  than  an  ordinary  degree.  He  had 
excellent  topographical  knowledge  and  the  faculty  which 
enables  some  men  to  know  instinctively  the  course  of 
mountains,  rivers,  and  streams ;  while  his  thorough  under 
standing  of  the  various  roads,  in  the  section  where  he  was 
operating,  enabled  him  to  correctly  determine  beforehand 
the  route  that  would  be  taken  by  the  enemy. 


CHAPTER   XVII 

ROANOKE    ISLAND 

AFTER  recovering  from  a  severe  illness  of  some  weeks* 
duration,  Wise  reported  to  the  War  Department  by  letter 
from  Rolleston,  dated  November  18,  requesting  that  the 
forces  comprising  his  Legion  be  ordered  to  the  point  where 
he  was  to  serve.  By  an  order  issued  December  21,  he  was 
assigned  to  the  command  of  the  military  district  composed 
of  that  portion  of  North  Carolina  lying  east  of  the  Chowan 
River,  which  section  was  attached  to  the  department  of 
Norfolk,  under  the  command  of  Major-General  Benjamin 
Huger.  Early  in  January  Wise  reported  for  duty  to  Gen 
eral  Huger  at  Norfolk,  and  on  the  7th  of  the  month  as 
sumed  command,  with  headquarters  at  Roanoke  Island. 
From  a  military  point  of  view,  this  post  was  of  incalcu 
lable  importance  to  the  Confederacy  and,  as  Wise  pointed 
out,  it  "  was  the  key  to  all  the  rear  defences  of  Norfolk." 
Moreover,  as  he  truly  said,  it  unlocked  the  Albemarle  and 
Currituck  sounds,  eight  rivers,  four  canals,  and  two  rail 
roads  ;  and  guarded  more  than  four-fifths  of  all  Norfolk's 
supplies. 

For  some  reason,  but  probably  on  account  of  the  fact 
that  the  command  of  the  island  had  been  constantly  trans 
ferred  from  one  officer  to  another,  the  defences  had  been 
almost  wholly  neglected,  and  it  was  at  this  period  in  dan 
ger  of  capture  by  the  Federal  force  at  Hatteras  Inlet,  as 
well  as  by  the  Burnside  expedition  then  being  fitted  out. 
x  305 


306  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

Wise  immediately  began  a  careful  reconnoissance,  in  com 
pany  with  Colonel  H.  M.  Shaw  of  the  Eighth  North  Caro 
lina  Infantry,  the  officer  he  had  found  in  command;  and 
through  the  courtesy  of  Flag-Captain  Lynch,  command 
ing  the  naval  fleet,  passed  in  the  Sea  Bird  through  the 
channels  on  either  side  of  Roanoke  Island.  The  military 
defences  of  the  island  consisted  of  three  turfed  sand  forts 
on  the  west  side,  near  the  upper  end  facing  Croatan 
Sound,  with  a  similar  fort  on  the  east  side  a  few  miles 
farther  down,  while  about  the  centre  was  a  redoubt  some 
seventy  or  eighty  yards  in  length  thrown  across  a  cause 
way  and  facing  south,  flanked  on  either  side  by  marshy 
ground.  The  positions  of  these  forts  had  been  badly  se 
lected.  In  the  opinion  of  Wise  they  should  have  been 
constructed  on  the  islands  of  marshes,  at  the  south  end, 
where  the  channel  was  very  narrow,  and  with  batteries  at 
Hommock's  and  Pugh's  landings.  Wise,  after  carefully 
informing  himself  of  the  needs  of  the  island  for  proper 
defence,  hurried  back  to  Norfolk  and  urged  upon  Gen 
eral  Huger  its  unprotected  condition  and  the  need  of 
pile-drivers,  dredging  machines,  ammunition,  artillery, 
and  barges  for  the  transportation  of  troops  and  supplies. 
He  returned  to  Roanoke  Island  on  the  llth,  and  set  to 
work  with  the  limited  means  at  his  command  to  put  the 
island  in  a  state  of  defence.  In  response  to  his  urgent 
calls,  Huger  wrote  that  he  did  not  consider  a  large  force 
necessary,  and  Mr.  Benjamin  replied  that  the  stock  of  pow 
der  at  Richmond  was  very  limited,  adding,  "  At  the  first 
indication,  however,  of  an  attack  on  Roanoke  Island  a 
supply  will  be  sent  you."  On  the  15th  of  January  he 
wrote  as  follows  to  the  Secretary  of  War:  "I  am  sure 
you  will  not  judge  me  importunate  when  I  inform  you 
that  I  returned  from  Roanoke  Island  to  Norfolk  last  Sat 
urday.  I  hasten  back,  after  a  short  reconnoissance,  to 


THE   DEFENCE   OF   ROANOKE  ISLAND  307 

apprise  headquarters  and  the  Department  that  there  are 
no  defences  there,  no  adequate  preparations  whatever  to 
meet  the  enemy,  and  to  forward  all  the  means  in  my  reach 
as  speedily  as  possible  to  make  the  key  of  all  the  rear  of 
Norfolk,  with  its  canals  and  railroads,  safe.  Inside  of  Hat- 
teras  Inlet  I  found  twenty-four  vessels  of  light  draught, 
eight  of  which  are  steamers,  said  to  carry  four  guns  each. 
They  are  at  farthest  but  thirty  miles  from  Roanoke  Island 
and  can  reach  there  in  four  hours  or  less,  to  attack  five 
small  gunboats  under  Captain  Lynch  and  four  small  land 
batteries,  wholly  inefficient.  Any  boat  drawing  seven  feet 
water,  or  less,  can  pass  the  Croatan  Sound  as  far  off  as 
one  and  one-fourth  miles  from  any  battery,  and  the 
enemy's  guns  can  silence  our  batteries  there  in  a  very 
short  time.  Neither  battery  is  casemated,  and  our  men 
there  are  untrained  to  heavy  pieces  mounted  on  navy 
carriages.  The  moment  the  enemy  passes  Croatan  Chan 
nel,  the  North  Landing  River,  North  River,  Pasquotank, 
Chowan,  Roanoke,  Alligator,  and  Scuppernong  rivers,  and 
the  Dismal  Swamp  and  Albemarle  and  Chesapeake  canals 
will  be  blockaded  effectually,  and  Norfolk  and  Portsmouth 
will  be  cut  off  from  supplies  of  corn,  pork,  and  forage.  The 
force  at  Hatteras  is  independent  of  the  Burnside  expedi 
tion.  No  matter  where  the  latter  is,  the  former  is  amply 
sufficient  to  capture  or  pass  Roanoke  Island  in  any  twelve 
hours.  Let  me  say,  then,  sir,  that  if  we  are  to  wait  for 
powder  from  Richmond  until  we  are  attacked  at  that 
island,  that  attack  will  be  capture,  and  our  defeat  will 
precede  our  supply  of  ammunition.  The  case  is  too  urgent 
for  me  to  delay  speaking  this  out  plainly  at  once." 

Finding  that  his  written  appeals  for  munitions  of  war 
and  men  were  unheeded  by  General  Huger  and  the  War 
Department,  Wise  hastened  to  Richmond,  to  confer  with 
the  authorities  there  and  urge  the  necessity  of  immediate 


308  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

preparation.  While  in  western  Virginia,  he  had  raised  his 
Legion  to  fifty-five  companies  of  all  arms,  divided  into  three 
regiments  of  infantry,  eight  cavalry  and  four  artillery  com 
panies,  numbering  in  all  some  twenty-five  hundred  effec 
tive  men.  It  had  been  understood,  at  the  time  that  he  was 
ordered  to  Richmond  from  Camp  Defiance,  that  his  Legion 
was  to  be  restored  to  his  command  in  the  east ;  but  up  to 
the  date  of  which  we  write,  this  had  not  been  done.  In 
response  to  his  appeals  for  reinforcements,  and  that  his 
Third  Regiment  of  Infantry  be  ordered  to  report  to  him, 
along  with  the  rest  of  his  troops,  Mr.  Benjamin  replied 
that  he  had  not  the  men  to  spare  at  the  time.  "  I  then 
urged,"  says  Wise,  "  that  General  Huger  had  about  fifteen 
thousand  men  in  the  front  of  Norfolk,  lying  idle  in  camp 
for  eight  months,  and  that  a  considerable  portion  of  them 
could  be  spared  for  the  defence  of  the  rear  of  Norfolk,  and 
especially  as  my  district  supplied  Norfolk  and  his  army 
with  nearly  or  quite  all  of  its  corn,  pork,  and  forage ; 
that  reinforcements  at  Roanoke  Island  were  as  absolutely 
necessary  to  the  defence  of  Norfolk  as  forces  in  its  front, 
and  that  particular  or  special  posts  should  not  be  allowed 
to  monopolize  nearly  all  the  men,  powder,  and  supplies." 
The  final  reply  of  the  Secretary  to  this  demand  was  a 
peremptory  order,  issued  on  January  22,  directing  Wise 
to  proceed  immediately  to  Roanoke  Island  and  assume 
command  of  the  troops  there.  Wise  forthwith  repaired 
to  his  post,  after  a  short  delay  in  Norfolk,  caused  by  lack 
of  transportation  facilities.  Of  the  state  of  affairs  at  the 
island  at  the  time  Wise  wrote  in  a  subsequent  report: 
"  My  two  regiments  (the  First  and  Second  of  the  Legion, 
numbering  seventeen  companies  and  less  than  eight  hun 
dred  men)  had  preceded  my  arrival,  and  for  want  of  quar 
ters  on  Roanoke  Island,  occupied  Nag's  Head.  It  was 
absolutely  necessary  to  maintain  some  sufficient  force 


THE  DEFENCE   OF   ROANOKE   ISLAND  309 

there  to  make  and  protect  a  ferry  across  Roanoke  Sound 
to  the  island  to  secure  a  comparatively  safe  depot  for 
provisions,  stores,  etc.,  and  to  guard  the  beach  against  the 
landing  of  the  enemy  north  of  Oregon  Inlet.  We  com 
menced  immediately  to  procure  lighters  for  the  ferry,  to 
repair  the  bridge,  and  to  make  a  magazine.  Early  on 
Friday,  January  31,  I  visited  Roanoke  Island,  meeting 
Colonel  Shaw  at  Weir's  Point.  I  gave  him  the  necessary 
orders  to  forward  the  pile-driving,  to  construct  breast 
works  at  Suple's  Hill,  and  to  keep  strong  guards  at  Hom- 
mock's,  Pugh's,  and  Ashby's  landings,  on  the  south  end 
of  the  island.  I  returned  then  to  Nag's  Head  on  Friday 
and  ordered  every  preparation  there.  At  neither  post  were 
there  any  tools  to  work  with,  no  axes,  shovels,  spades, 
nails,  etc.,  and  requisitions  had  been  made  in  vain  for 
them  both  at  Richmond  and  in  Norfolk.  Neither  place 
had  any  teams,  except  two  pairs  of  broken-down  mules 
at  the  island  and  some  weak  and  insufficient  ox-carts. 
The  consequence  was  that  men  had  to  carry  everything  on 
their  shoulders  and  no  work  could  be  accomplished,  and  in 
the  evening  of  Friday  a  cold  rain  had  set  in,  which  lasted 
until  the  evening  of  the  5th  instant. 

"  On  Saturday  evening,  the  1st  instant,  I  was  seized 
(while  attending  to  duty)  with  a  high  fever,  resulting  in 
an  acute  attack  of  pleurisy,  threatening  pneumonia,  from 
which  I  was  unable  to  rise  until  late  on  the  evening  of 
the  8th  instant,  but  from  bed  continued  to  issue  orders  and 
to  despatch  preparations  for  the  enemy,  and  on  the  morning 
of  the  6th  the  enemy  appeared  off  the  southern  end  of  the 
island." 

The  fleet  organized  by  Major-General  Ambrose  E.  Burn- 
side,  for  the  purpose  of  effecting  lodgements  along  the 
southern  coast,  by  means  of  which  troops  could  penetrate 
the  interior,  had  embarked  from  Annapolis  on  January  5, 


310  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

1862,  for  Fortress  Monroe,  from  which  point  they  sailed 
for  Hatteras  Inlet,  the  entrance  to  Pamlico  Sound.  The 
transports  accompanying  the  naval  fleet  had  a  capacity  for 
carrying  fifteen  thousand  troops,  who  were  divided  into 
three  brigades  under  Generals  Foster,  Reno,  and  Parke. 
The  fleet,  which  consisted  of  sixty-five  vessels,  presented 
an  imposing  spectacle  as  it  came  in  sight  off  the  lower  end 
of  the  island. 

On  the  morning  of  the  7th,  the  Federal  gunboats  en 
tered  Roanoke  Sound,  and  by  eleven  o'clock  were  opposite 
the  island,  and  engaged  with  the  Confederate  fleet  and  the 
batteries  alongshore.  The  insignificant  tugboats  of  Com 
modore  Lynch  were  compelled  to  retire  up  the  sound, 
though  they  managed  to  keep  up  a  brisk  fire,  and  during 
the  afternoon  the  enemy  succeeded,  under  cover  of  the 
gunboats,  in  landing  all  of  their  force  a  short  distance 
above  Ashby's,  with  the  exception  of  one  regiment  which 
was  gotten  ashore  the  following  morning. 

Colonel  J.  V.  Jordan,  of  the  Thirty-first  North  Carolina 
troops,  was  in  command  of  the  small  force  stationed  at 
Ashby's,  where  it  had  been  anticipated  the  enemy  would 
attempt  to  land.  Between  this  point  and  the  actual  place 
of  landing,  which  was  a  short  distance  above  the  former,  lay 
a  large  marsh,  impassable  for  artillery ;  and  fearing  that  he 
might  be  cut  off,  Jordan  ordered  a  retreat  to  Suple's  Hill, 
about  a  mile  and  a  quarter  above,  where  the  redoubt  pre 
viously  mentioned  had  been  thrown  across  the  main  road, 
or  causeway,  leading  up  the  centre  of  the  island. 

In  obedience  to  orders  from  Wise,  Lieutenant-Colonel 
Frank  P.  Anderson  of  his  Legion  left  Nag's  Head  early  on 
the  morning  of  the  7th,  for  the  island,  with  two  companies 
of  the  Forty-sixth,  and  ten  of  the  Fifty-ninth  Virginia 
regiments,  in  all  about  450  men,  and  for  some  reason, 
probably  deficiency  in  means  of  transportation,  it  was 


THE  ATTACK  ON  ROANOKE  ISLAND        311 

six  P.M.  before  they  were  marched  to  the  earthwork  across 
the  main  road,  whither  Jordan  had  fallen  back. 

Owing  to  the  sickness  of  Wise,  who  was  still  ill  and 
confined  to  his  bed  at  Nag's  Head,  the  command  of  the 
island  devolved  upon  Colonel  Shaw,  whose  entire  avail 
able  force,  "exclusive  of  the  companies  on  duty  at  the 
several  batteries,  amounted  to  1434,  rank  and  file" ;  which 
number  was  made  up  of  men  belonging  to  the  Eighth  and 
Thirty-first  North  Carolina  and  the  Forty-sixth  and  Fifty- 
ninth  Virginia  regiments. 

Early  on  the  morning  of  the  8th,  the  pickets  reported 
the  approach  of  the  enemy,  and  about  seven  o'clock  a 
general  engagement  was  begun,  Shaw  soon  opening  with 
his  artillery  stationed  at  the  redoubt,  which  consisted 
of  three  guns  only,  —  one  twenty-four-pounder  howitzer, 
one  eighteen-pounder  field-piece,  and  one  six-pounder. 
Colonel  Anderson  meanwhile  had  deployed  three  com 
panies  on  his  right  and  left,  in  the  swamp,  under  the 
commands  of  Captains  Wise  on  the  left  and  Coles  of 
the  Forty-sixth  on  the  right  and  Lieutenant  Hazlett  of  the 
Fifty-ninth  Virginia  Regiment.  The  three  brigades  of 
the  enemy,  with  General  Foster  in  the  centre  and  advance, 
and  Generals  Reno  and  Parke  on  the  left  and  right  respec 
tively,  numbered  probably  fifteen  thousand  men,  and  were 
supplied  with  several  pieces  of  artillery  from  the  boats. 
The  Federals  were  able  to  penetrate  the  low  marshy 
ground  which  lay  south  of  the  redoubt ;  and  the  struggle 
continued  until  12.20,  when  the  artillery  ammunition  of 
Shaw  being  exhausted  and  his  right  flank  turned  by  the 
brigade  of  Reno,  he  was  compelled  to  yield  the  place.  In 
his  report  of  the  engagement  Colonel  Shaw  says :  "  With 
the  very  great  disparity  of  forces,  the  moment  the  redoubt 
was  flanked  I  considered  the  island  lost.  The  struggle 
could  have  been  protracted  and  the  small  body  of  brave 


312  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY  A.  WISE 

men,  which  had  been  held  in  reserve,  might  have  been 
brought  up  into  the  open  space  to  receive  the  fire  of  the 
overwhelming  force  on  our  flank,  which  was  under  cover 
of  trees;  but  they  would  have  been  sacrificed  without  the 
smallest  hope  of  a  successful  result." 

Captain  O.  Jennings  Wise  and  Captain  Coles,  in  com 
mand  of  the  Confederate  skirmishers  thrown  forward  on  the 
right  and  left,  had  fallen  while  engaged  in  bravely  cheering 
on  their  men.  The  former,  though  dangerously  wounded 
in  the  thigh  and  breast,  had  been  carried  by  his  comrades 
to  a  boat  near  the  head  of  the  island  and  the  party  were 
endeavoring  to  escape  to  Nag's  Head,  on  the  opposite 
beach,  when  they  were  fired  upon  by  the  men  of  the  Ninth 
New  York  Regiment  and  compelled  to  return.  Captain 
Wise  was  twice  shot  while  his  men  were  carrying  him 
from  the  field,  and  his  four  wounds,  several  of  which  were 
severe,  left  no  hope  of  his  recovery. 

Late  on  the  afternoon  of  the  engagement,  General 
Wise,  who  was  then  lying  ill  with  pneumonia  at  Nag's 
Head,  was  placed  in  a  wagon  and  driven  fifteen  miles  up 
the  beach,  accompanied  by  a  small  remnant  of  his  men 
who  had  escaped,  and  three  companies  under  Colonel 
Richardson,  who  had  remained  at  Nag's  Head  during  the 
fight.  From  the  Canal  Bridge,  the  tug  Currituck  was 
despatched  under  a  flag  of  truce  to  Roanoke  Island,  to 
inquire  for  the  killed  and  wounded,  and  to  obtain  the 
bodies  of  Captains  Coles  and  Wise  and  Lieutenant  Selden. 

Upon  the  return  of  the  boat,  from  her  sad  errand,  Wise 
directed  that  the  coffin  containing  the  remains  of  his  son 
be  opened.  "  The  old  hero,"  wrote  an  eye-witness,  "  bent 
over  the  body  of  his  son,  on  whose  pale  face  the  full  moon 
threw  its  light,  kissed  the  cold  brow  many  times  and 
exclaimed,  in  an  agony  of  emotion,  '  Oh,  my  brave  boy, 
you  have  died  for  me,  you  have  died  for  me.' " 


DEATH   OF   CAPTAIN   O.  J.  WISE  313 

Wise  proceeded  with  his  handful  of  troops  northward, 
by  way  of  Currituck  Court- House,  and  was  later  joined  by 
his  artillery  under  Colonel  Henningsen,  which  last  had 
never  reached  him  at  Roanoke  on  account  of  an  interrup 
tion  of  his  orders  by  General  Huger.  After  placing  ob 
structions  at  the  mouth  of  the  Albemarle  and  Chesapeake 
Canal,  Wise,  deeming  it  impossible  for  him  to  withstand 
an  attack  of  the  enemy  with  his  mere  handful  of  men,  fell 
back  to  Great  Bridge,  in  Norfolk  County,  where  he  arrived 
on  the  morning  of  the  16th,  after  a  three  days'  march 
through  a  steady  rain. 

A  few  days  after  the  battle  at  Roanoke  Island,  Wise 
wrote  of  himself  in  a  letter  to  Huger :  "  Providence 
sharply  prohibited  me  from  sharing  the  fate  of  my  brave, 
devoted  troops,  but  I  can  sit  in  my  saddle  now.  I  am 
happier  at  the  post  of  duty  than  I  could  be  at  home  now 
wailing  for  its  best  scion,  cut  down  in  its  full  vigor ;  and, 
God  willing,  I  never  mean  to  leave  the  remnant  of  my 
men  again  until  I  see  them  recruited  and  proudly  reani 
mated."  But  despite  his  eagerness  to  serve,  the  hardships 
of  the  campaign  had  told  upon  him  in  his  feeble  condition, 
and  the  leave  of  absence,  which  was  shortly  accorded  him, 
came  at  a  time  when  he  stood  in  sore  need  of  it.  On 
account  of  the  fact  that  the  disaster  at  Roanoke  Island 
had  broken  up  the  organization  of  his  Legion,  General  Will 
iam  Mahone  of  the  Second  Brigade  was  ordered  to  assume 
command  of  the  district,  and  Wise  was  granted  a  furlough, 
after  which  he  was  to  be  assigned  to  the  command  of  Gen 
eral  Joseph  E.  Johnston. 

From  Great  Bridge  Wise  wrote  to  the  Secretary  of  War 
on  February  21,  1862,  detailing  at  great  length  a  history 
of  the  events  prior  to  the  engagement  at  Roanoke  Island, 
as  well  as  a  report  of  that  affair,  and  demanding  a  court 
of  inquiry  as  to  the  defences  of  this  post  and  the  responsi- 


314  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

bility  for  the  disaster.  A  resolution  was  passed  by  the 
Confederate  House  of  Representatives  requesting  Mr. 
Benjamin  to  lay  Wise's  report  before  that  body,  which  was 
done ;  and  a  committee  was  appointed  to  investigate  the 
affair,  which,  after  an  elaborate  examination  of  all  the  facts 
and  circumstances,  submitted  a  report,  commending  the 
energy  and  foresight  of  Wise  and  completely  exonerating 
him  from  all  responsibility  for  the  defeat  sustained  by  the 
Southern  troops,  and  closed  by  attributing  the  failure  of 
the  defence  to  General  Huger  and  Mr.  Benjamin. 

A  curious  bit  of  unwritten  history  has  come  to  light  in 
this  connection.  Some  years  after  the  war,  Mr.  Benjamin, 
in  a  letter  to  Colonel  Charles  Marshall,  stated  that  he  had 
directed  General  Huger  to  send  powder  from  Norfolk  to 
Roarioke  Island,  but  had  been  informed  by  the  latter  that 
if  he  obeyed  this  order,  Norfolk  would  be  left  without 
ammunition.  Mr.  Benjamin  then  says :  "  I  consulted  the 
President  whether  it  was  best  for  the  country  that  I  should 
submit  to  unmerited  censure,  or  reveal  to  a  congressional 
committee  our  poverty  and  my  utter  inability  to  supply 
the  requisitions  of  General  Wise,  and  thus  run  the  risk 
that  the  fact  should  become  known  to  some  of  the  spies  of 
the  enemy,  of  whose  activity  we  were  well  assured.  It  was 
thought  best  for  the  public  interest  that  I  should  submit 
to  censure." 

It  is  superfluous  to  add  that  the  above  statement  reflects 
the  highest  credit  upon  the  patriotism  of  Mr.  Benjamin, 
but  there  appears  no  reason  to  doubt  that  the  committee 
was  right  in  concluding  that  it  was  easily  within  the 
power  of  General  Huger  to  have  transported  to  Roanoke 
Island  arms  and  ammunition,  as  well  as  a  part  of  the  large 
force  under  his  command  who  were  then  idle  in  camp  at 
Norfolk. 

The  Confederate  squadron  at  Roanoke  Island  consisted 


THE   SQUADRON   AT   ROANOKE   ISLAND  315 

of  eight  vessels,  two  of  which  were  side-wheel  river  steam 
boats  and  the  remainder  screw  tugboats,  mounting  one 
thirty-two-pounder  rifled  gun  each.  In  consequence  of 
their  hastily  improvised  character,  the  war-ships  under 
Lynch  came  to  be  dubbed  the  "Mosquito  fleet,"  and 
though  the  officers  and  men  aboard  conducted  themselves 
handsomely  during  the  engagement,  it  is  hardly  necessary 
to  comment  upon  the  absurdity  of  sending  such  a  collec 
tion  of  tugs  to  meet  the  Burnside  expedition,  instead  of 
using  them  to  transport  troops  and  supplies,  through  the 
canals  leading  from  Norfolk  into  the  waters  of  North  Caro 
lina.  Had  this  been  done  and  proper  fortifications  con 
structed  at  the  marshes,  off  the  south  end  of  the  island, 
even  the  formidable  fleet  of  Burnside  could  have  been  kept 
at  bay. 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

WRITES  TO  GENERAL  LEE  ADVOCATING  THE  CONSTRUCTION  OF 
A  MARINE  BATTERY  BY  THE  CONFEDERACY.  ASSIGNMENT 
TO  COMMAND  A  BRIGADE.  TAKES  PART  IN  BATTLE  OF  MAL- 
VERN  HILL.  STATIONED  AT  CHAFFIN?S  BLUFF.  ANECDOTE 
OF  GENERALS  LEE  AND  WISE.  WILLIAMSBURG  EXPEDITION. 
ORDERED  TO  SOUTH  CAROLINA.  A  WAR-TIME  AURORA  BO 
RE  ALIS 

FROM  Great  Bridge  Wise  returned,  as  has  been  else 
where  stated,  to  his  home  at  Rolleston,  near  Norfolk, 
having  been  granted  a  furlough  of  some  days  in  order 
to  recruit  his  broken  health.  While  on  this  leave  of 
absence,  he  witnessed  the  great  naval  fight  on  the  9th  of 
March  between  the  Merrimac  and  the  Monitor,  which 
occurred  in  Hampton  Roads,  not  far  distant  from  his 
home.  On  the  3d  of  May,  1861,  not  long  after  Virginia 
seceded,  but  before  she  had  formally  united  with  the 
Confederacy,  Wise  wrote  to  General  Lee  describing  the 
model  for  a  marine  battery  devised  by  Commodore  James 
Barren,  and  which  the  latter  had  in  former  years  exhibited 
before  the  naval  committee  of  the  House  of  Representa 
tives  over  which  Wise  had  presided.  Barron  presented 
his  model  to  Wise,  and  at  the  outbreak  of  the  war  the 
idea  of  such  an  ironclad,  as  a  means  of  harbor  defence, 
at  once  suggested  itself.  General  Lee,  in  his  letter  of 
reply  to  Wise,  which  was  dated  May  24,  1861,  stated 
that  he  had  been  induced  to  lay  the  latter's  communica- 

316 


WISE   AND   THE    "  MERKIMAC  "  317 

tion  before  the  executive  council,  but  that  owing  to  the 
numerous  duties  then  pressing  upon  them,  and  with  their 
limited  means,  they  were  unable  to  undertake  the  con 
struction  of  such  a  vessel  at  that  time. 

A  few  days  later  Virginia  had  been  joined  to  the  Con 
federacy  and,  early  in  June,  the  Hon.  Stephen  R.  Mallory, 
the  Secretary  of  the  Navy,  requested  Lieutenant  John  M. 
Brooke  to  design  an  ironclad;  and  as  a  result  of  the 
latter's  inventive  genius,  the  frigate  Merrimac  was  raised 
at  Norfolk  and  converted  into  the  Virginia,  the  distinctive 
features  of  which  were  the  "submerging  the  ends  of  the 
ship  and  the  eaves  of  the  casemate."  Wise  was  mistaken 
in  thinking  that  through  his  letter  to  General  Lee,  the 
remodelling  of  the  Merrimac  had  been  begun,1  as  Lieu 
tenant  Brooke  was  not  familiar  with  Barren's  design ; 
although  it  is  quite  possible  that  the  letter  was  after 
ward  referred  to  Secretary  Mallory,  and  suggested  to 
him  the  practicability  of  an  armored  vessel  as  a  means 
of  harbor  defence.  Mr.  Mallory  had  been  chairman  of  the 
committee  on  Naval  Affairs  in  the  United  States  Senate, 
and  his  experience  in  matters  of  the  sort  had  made  him 
quick  to  see  the  advantage  of  a  ram  constructed  after  the 
design  of  the  Virginia. 

Wise  reached  Richmond  on  the  18th  of  March,  and  for 
some  weeks  was  occupied  with  the  investigation  of  the 
Roanoke  Island  disaster  by  the  Confederate  Congress,  from 
whom  he  received  the  most  enthusiastic  endorsement  as 
to  his  conduct  throughout.  The  command  of  his  Legion, 
which  body  had  suffered  severely,  had  been  taken  from 
him,  and  it  was  through  the  influence  of  General  Lee  that 
he  was  assigned  to  the  command  of  a  brigade  in  May, 
1862.  The  remainder  of  his  Forty-sixth  and  Fifty-ninth 
regiments  were  restored  to  his  command,  and  to  these 

1  See  "  Seven  Decades  of  the  Union,"  pages  279-282. 


318  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY  A.  WISE 

were  added  the  Twenty-sixth  and  Thirty-fourth  Virginia 
regiments,  the  whole  being  organized  into  a  brigade  of 
infantry.  To  the  four  regiments,  commanded  by  Colonel 
R.  T.  W.  Duke  of  the  Forty-sixth,  Colonel  William  B. 
Tabb  of  the  Fifty-ninth,  Colonel  Powhatan  R.  Page  of 
the  Twenty-sixth,  and  Colonel  J.  Thomas  Goode  of  the 
Thirty-fourth,  were  added  two  batteries  of  artillery  under 
Major  A.  W.  Starke,  commanded  by  Captains  Armistead 
and  French,  with  a  few  cavalry  for  vedettes.  The  force 
was  stationed  to  guard  the  batteries  at  Chaffin's  Bluff, 
about  seven  miles  east  of  Richmond  and  on  the  river 
road,  while  the  battles  around  that  city  were  in  progress. 

On  the  morning  of  June  30,  Wise,  in  response  to  a 
verbal  message  from  General  Theophilus  H.  Holmes,  but 
without  orders,  voluntarily  joined  the  latter's  command, 
with  two  regiments  of  infantry  and  two  companies  of 
cavalry,  at  the  Dill  house,  near  New  Market.  His  men 
shared  the  fortunes  of  that  division  during  the  three 
days'  fighting  at  Frazier's  Farm  and  Malvern  Hill,  but 
were  posted  too  far  around  toward  the  river,  on  Lee's 
extreme  right,  to  take  an  active  part  in  these  engage 
ments.  After  this  Wise  returned  to  Chaffin's,  at  which 
point  as  well  as  at  the  Diascund  and  White  House,  his 
brigade  did  post  duty  for  sixteen  months,  guarding  the 
entire  peninsula  from  Richmond  to  Williamsburg  on  the 
James,  Chickahominy,  and  Pamunkey  rivers. 

Just  prior  to  the  battles  around  Richmond  an  amusing 
incident  had  occurred  at  Wise's  headquarters.  Before 
relating  the  story,  however,  we  will  state  what  we  have 
hitherto  omitted ;  namely,  that  Wise  was  a  hard  swearer, 
and  his  army  career  had  not  diminished  his  propensity  to 
indulge  this  habit.  A  farmer  named  Taylor,  who  lived 
on  the  Osborne  turnpike,  a  few  miles  east  of  Richmond, 
had  complained  of  depredations  on  his  vegetable  patches 


STATIONED   AT    CHAFFIN's   BLUFF  319 

by  the  troops,  and  guards  had  been  stationed  by  Wise  to 
prevent  further  foraging  expeditions  of  this  character. 
One  day  Taylor  came  to  Wise,  in  a  state  of  considerable 
rage,  and  complained  that  the  guards  were  not  doing  their 
duty,  and  that  the  soldiers  continued  to  steal  his  vegeta 
bles.  Wise  told  him  that  the  men  were  doing  the  best 
they  could  to  protect  the  property,  but  Taylor  continued 
to  denounce  the  soldiers,  which  resulted  in  the  former 
delivering  him  a  lecture  on  the  sacrifices  and  privations 
of  the  troops,  and  concluding  by  the  announcement  that 
he  intended  to  withdraw  all  guards,  and  that  he  must 
take  care  of  his  own  truck  patch.  Taylor,  much  incensed, 
mounted  his  horse  and  rode  away  shaking  his  fist  at  Wise, 
and  calling  out  that  he  intended  reporting  him  to  General 
Lee.  Not  long  after,  the  latter  rode  up,  accompanied  by 
General  Longstreet,  and  as  the  two  were  dismounting 
Wise  advanced  to  meet  them.  General  Lee  greeted  him 
in  a  very  stern  manner,  and  said :  "  General  Wise,  I  have 
a  grave  charge  against  you  to  investigate.  I  have  been 
informed  that  you  have  disobeyed  general  order  No.  — 
and  have  allowed  your  men  to  depredate  on  the  truck 
farms  hereabouts ;  but,  sir,  I  must  have  your  version  of  the 
affair,  for  the  credibility  of  the  witness  against  you  is 
called  into  question  by  the  fact  that  he  told  me  that  you 
swore  at  him.  Now,  sir,  knowing  you  as  well  as  I  do,  I 
cannot  believe  this  to  be  true."  Wise  looked  at  him 
intently,  and  observing  a  suppressed  smile,  put  his  hand 
on  General  Lee's  shoulder  and  replied,  "Well,  General 
Lee,  if  you  will  do  the  praying  for  the  Army  of  Northern 
Virginia,  I'll  be  damned  if  I  will  not  do  the  swearing." 

The  brigade  remained  in  camp  at  Chaifin's  and  at  points 
along  the  peninsula,  during  the  winter  of  1862-63,  but 
early  in  April  of  the  latter  year  were  ordered  to  make  a 
divertisement  in  favor  of  Longstreet  in  his  operations 


320  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

around  Suffolk,  in  Nansemond  County,  and  to  prevent 
the  enemy  from  sending  reinforcements  from  Yorktown 
against  him.  Wise  thus  describes  the  expedition :  — 

"I  was  ordered  to  move  as  low  down  as  practicable 
toward  Fortress  Monroe,  and  to  threaten  the  enemy  as 
close  as  possible  and  do  him  all  the  damage  in  my  power, 
without  risking  a  battle  unless  certain  of  victory.  Know 
ing  that  the  enemy  had  moved  up  in  force  to  the  redoubts 
around  Williamsburg,  I  pressed  with  all  the  available  force  at 
my  command  —  three  regiments,  the  Twenty-sixth,  Thirty- 
fourth,  and  Fifty-ninth,  a  few  cavalry  of  the  Holcombe  Le 
gion,  and  Rives's  Battery  of  artillery,  all  numbering  eleven 
hundred  effective  men  —  to  the  Six-Mile  ordinary,  on  the 
James  City  road.  There  I  issued  orders  to  the  Fifty-ninth 
to  proceed  after  nightfall  to  College  Creek,  to  cross  that 
creek  after  the  setting  of  the  moon  at  one  o'clock  A.M.,  and, 
passing  through  Tetter's  Neck,  to  gain  the  Cheese-Cake 
Church  on  the  Warwick  road,  and  thence  to  attack  the 
headquarters  and  stores  of  the  enemy  at  Whitaker's  mill, 
five  miles  in  the  rear  of  the  redoubts  at  Williamsburg; 
whilst  I,  with  the  Twenty-sixth  and  Thirty-fourth  regi 
ments,  and  Rives's  Battery  and  the  squadron  of  cavalry, 
would  attack  Williamsburg  at  daybreak.  The  whole 
force  of  Colonel  William  B.  Tabb,  at  the  head  of  the 
Fifty-ninth,  was  210  men  of  his  regiment  and  8  of  the 
James  City  cavalry  belonging  to  Fitz  Lee's  command  on 
furlough,  numbering  in  all  218  men,  to  perform  this  haz 
ardous  movement  in  the  rear  of  the  enemy.  It  was  known 
and  reasonably  supposed  from  the  distance  and  the  ground 
under  ordinary  circumstances,  that  six  hours  would  enable 
the  movement  to  reach  the  rear  of  Whitaker's  mill  by  day 
break,  at  a  pace  of  only  two  miles  per  hour,  and  that  thus 
the  attack  would  commence  simultaneously  front  and  rear. 
Colonel  Tabb's  orders  further  were  that,  in  the  event  he 


THE   WILLIAMSBURG    EXPEDITION  321 

succeeded  in  destroying  the  enemy's  stores  at  Whitaker's 
mill,  he  should  march  quickly  and  directly  upon  the  rear 
of  the  redoubts  at  Williamsburg,  which  we  would  storm 
or  feign  to  storm  in  front  and  on  their  left  flank.  The 
Fifty-ninth,  after  receiving  orders  and  taking  a  little  rest, 
proceeded  promptly  to  College  Creek,  waited  there  until 
the  moon  went  down  and  crossed  into  Tetter's  Neck,  pass 
ing  within  some  of  the  sentinel  posts  of  the  enemy,  near 
the  Hospital  Cemetery,  when  lo !  they  found  themselves 
tangled  in  the  timber  of  that  Neck  felled  by  the  enemy  so 
as  to  form  obstructions  worse  than  that  of  regular  abattis. 
Instead  of  being  able  to  move  at  a  pace  of  two  and  a  half 
miles  an  hour,  they  could  not  advance  more  rapidly  than 
a  mile  an  hour  in  the  darkness  of  the  night,  and  this  de 
layed  their  reaching  the  rear  of  Whitaker's  mill  until 
nearly  eight  o'clock  A.M.  At  daybreak  we  advanced 
upon  the  front  and  entered  Williamsburg,  and  the  enemy 
opened  in  full  fire  from  the  redoubts.  Colonel  Powhatan  R. 
Page  was  ordered  with  eight  hundred  men  of  the  Twenty- 
sixth  and  Thirty -fourth  to  quietly  move  down  a  ravine  to 
the  left  of  the  redoubt  on  the  enemy's  left,  and  one  section 
of  artillery,  two  companies  of  infantry,  and  the  squadron 
of  cavalry  were  kept  in  the  front.  Nothing  was  heard  of 
Tabb's  movement  to  the  rear,  and  the  enemy  in  the  re 
doubts  and  mounted  were  reported  twenty-six  hundred 
strong.  One  section  of  artillery  under  Rives  was  pushed 
forward  in  front  of  the  enemy's  left  redoubt,  and  thus  the 
fight  continued  until  eleven  A.M.,  when  a  single  shell  cut 
down  three  of  Rives's  artillery  horses  and  shattered  one  of 
his  gun-carriages.  Still,  nothing  was  heard  of  Tabb,  and 
there  was  danger  of  a  charge  from  the  enemy  and  of  the 
loss  of  the  damaged  gun.  Immediately,  the  order  was 
given  to  withdraw  the  section  from  the  field,  Page  was 
recalled,  and  we  fell  back  in  good  order,  with  but  little 


322  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

loss,  just  out  of  the  town,  and  were  in  position  there  when 
about  one  o'clock  P.M.  we  saw  the  immense  column  of 
smoke  rising  from  the  conflagration  of  the  enemy's  quar 
ters  and  stores  at  Whitaker's  mill,  and  then  knowing  that 
Tabb  was  successfully  at  his  work,  we  rapidly  returned  to 
the  town  and  met  him  in  timely  retreat.  He  had  burned 
all  of  their  munitions  and  provisions,  making  in  all  from 
three  to  five  hundred  thousand  dollars'  worth  of  the  enemy's 
property  destroyed  and  captured,  without  the  loss  of  a  man. 
We  remained  for  days  relieving  the  distressed  inhabitants, 
saved  a  large  amount  of  property  for  many  families,  and 
returned  without  loss,  to  meet  the  approval  of  the  War 
Department  and  of  General  Elzey  at  headquarters." 

His  post  of  duty  at  Chaffin's  Bluff  had  denied  Wise  the 
opportunity  to  participate  in  the  battles  against  McClellan, 
or  those  fought  the  year  following ;  and  while  the  army 
of  northern  Virginia  was  winning  imperishable  renown, 
he  was  compelled  to  serve  at  a  point  affording  no  oppor 
tunity  for  distinction,  and  to  see  officers  of  inferior  rank 
appointed  to  positions  above  him,  almost  daily.  It  was 
the  policy  of  Mr.  Davis  to  give  to  West  Pointers  the 
preference  in  the  service,  and  he  was,  moreover,  in  all 
probability  not  favorably  inclined  toward  Wise  personally, 
as  the  latter  strongly  disapproved  of  the  civil  adminis 
tration  of  the  Confederacy,  and  did  not  hesitate  to  de 
nounce  it  unsparingly.  In  the  opinion  of  Wise,  Davis 
was  not  the  man  for  the  position  he  held,  and  he  did  not 
fail  to  express  himself  on  this  point  as  on  all  others,  and 
naturally  enough  this  did  not  increase  Wise's  chances  of 
promotion.  Both  he  and  his  men  had  chafed  under  the 
comparative  inactivity  imposed  upon  them  at  Chaffin's 
Bluff,  though  Wise  never  suffered  the  time  passed  in 
camp  to  be  wasted,  and  the  brigade  had  perfected  its  drill 
to  a  high  degree  of  efficiency,  while  the  men  were  required 


STATIONED   AT   CHAFFIN's   BLUFF  323 

to  construct  an  inner  line  of  defences,  which  last,  accord 
ing  to  General  Ewell,  saved  Richmond  during  the  summer 
of  1864,  and  caused  that  officer  to  address  a  letter  to  Wise 
acknowledging  the  service  performed  by  him.  The  men 
were  also  employed  in  gardening,  tanning  leather,  and 
other  useful  avocations,  until  September,  1863,  when  the 
welcome  order  was  received  to  proceed  to  Charleston. 
Of  the  camp  life  prior  to  this  period,  Wise  afterward 
wrote  :  "  Our  supplies  whilst  at  Chaffin's  were  vastly  aided 
and  improved  by  4  the  old  folks  at  home '  in  King  and 
Queen,  Gloucester,  Matthews,  Essex,  Accomack,  and  North 
ampton.  The  latter  counties  had  to  run  a  blockade 
through  narrow  passes  in  the  smallest  craft,  at  night,  but 
they  sent  clothes  and  medicine  and  food.  Essex  and 
Matthews  and  Gloucester  poured  out  their  cornucopias 
upon  us ;  but  oh !  shall  I  ever  forget  the  little  hen-coop 
carts  of  King  and  Queen.  They  were  constantly  coming 
packed  to  the  top  of  their  cover-hoops  always  with  good 
things  from  the  dear  mothers  and  sisters  and  wives  at 
home !  .  .  .  One  of  those  little  carts,  hauled  by  a  pony, 
was  like  an  open  sesame :  it  was  full  of  hams  and  chickens 
and  eggs  and  melons  and  cakes  and  cider  and  home-made 
wine  and  letters  and  socks  and  blankets.  And  the  mem 
ory  of  its  fulness  is  nothing  to  that  of  its  pathos.  Not 
a  company  got  its  home  greeting  that  some  poor  soldier 
did  not  bring  to  me  some  choicest  present  of  the  sweets 
he  so  seldom  got,  compared  with  my  own  opportunities. 
4  Why,  my  good  comrade,  keep  'em  for  yourself,  you  need 
them  more  than  I  do.'  But  no,  he  wouldn't,  he  couldn't 
eat  them  if  I  did  not  take  part,  and  hear  what  the  '  old 
woman '  or  the  children  said  about  us.  God  bless  my 
true-hearted,  humble,  brave  privates  who  loved  for  me 
to  taste  their  morsels  of  good  things.  There  was  no  gen 
erosity  like  theirs.  It  forgot  everything  but  self-sacrifice 
and  devotion,  cheerfully  made  and  paid." 


324  THE   LIFE  OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

The  brigade  reached  Charleston  in  September,  1863, 
having  been  ordered  to  report  to  General  Beauregard  to 
take  part  in  the  defence  of  the  South  Carolina  coast.  Of 
his  services  under  the  above-named  officer  Wise  subse 
quently  wrote :  — 

"  The  command  preceding  that  of  Beauregard  had  an 
effective  force  of  forty-five  thousand  men,  to  defend  the 
department  from  North  Carolina  to  the  Cape  of  Florida ; 
whilst  Beauregard  had  for  the  same  defence  only  about 
seventeen  thousand  effective  men.  This  compelled  a  dis 
tribution  of  forces  very  wide  apart,  and  hardly  in  support 
ing  distances,  so  large  were  the  districts  and  extended  the 
coasts  of  the  command.  To  our  brigade  was  assigned 
the  duty  of  guarding  the  entire  district  lying  between 
the  Ashley  and  the  Edisto,  with  the  exception  of  James's 
Island.  On  the  Atlantic  front  it  extended  from  the  Stono 
to  the  Edisto,  including  John's  Island,  Kiahwah,  Sea- 
brooks,  Jehosse,  King's  and  Slau's  islands  and  the  Wadma- 
law.  At  first,  our  headquarters  were  at  Wappoo,  and 
then  farther  south  at  Adams's  Run,  and  extended  from 
Willtown  on  the  Edisto  to  the  Church  Flats  on  the  Stono, 
posting  Willtown,  the  Toogadoo,  the  Dahoo,  King's  Island, 
Glen's  Island,  Church  Flats,  and  the  Haulover,  near  the 
mouth  of  the  Bohicket  on  John's  Island,  besides  the  forces 
in  reserve  at  Adams's  Run.  It  was  a  very  laborious  and 
hazardous  defence  of  a  coast  indented  for  every  mile 
almost  by  waters  accessible,  not  only  to  the  war  steamers, 
but  to  the  land  forces  from  Morris's  Island  in  the  occu 
pancy  of  the  enemy.  In  every  emergency  these  troops 
did  their  whole  duty  promptly,  successfully,  and  with  the 
approbation  and  commendation  of  their  superiors.  Their 
duties  were  constant  and  active  during  the  whole  period 
from  September,  1863,  until  March,  1864,  in  doing  guard 
duty  in  the  most  exposed  situations,  and  in  details  upon 


ORDERED  TO  SOUTH  CAROLINA          325 

extensive  earthworks,  at  many  and  various  points.  But 
they  were  not  left  to  non-combatant  work  alone.  They 
had  two  memorable  opportunities  of  showing  their  alacrity 
and  bravery  in  the  fields  of  battle.  The  two  war  steamers, 
Marble  Head  and  Pawnee,  were  too  curious  in  running  up 
the  Stono  to  peer  at  a  Quaker  battery,  which  had  been 
placed  above  the  mouth  of  the  Abbepoola,  to  deter  the 
enemy,  and  Colonel  Page  commanding,  with  Major  Jen 
kins  of  the  South  Carolina  troops,  and  Colonel  Del. 
Kemper  of  the  artillery,  were  ordered  to  drive  them  off. 
This  they  did  with  gallantry,  riddling  the  Marble  Head, 
but  the  Pawnee  got  a  cross-fire  on  our  batteries  and  forced 
Page  to  fall  back,  but  he  fully  effected  the  purpose 
of  the  expedition  and  won  my  most  hearty  thanks.  He 
was  one  of  the  coolest  men  I  ever  saw  under  fire.  On  his 
dull  sorrel  horse,  he  rode  about  the  field  under  showers 
of  shot  and  shell,  without  turning  his  head,  or  giving  it 
a  twitch  even  at  the  sound  too  near  of  that  awful  aerial 
whisper :  '  where  is  he  ?  where  is  he  ? '  before  an  explo 
sion  which  crashed  as  if  heaven  and  earth  were  coming 
together.  His  mounted  unconcern  was  so  marked  that  it 
did  not  escape  the  notice  of  that  cool  and  gallant  soldier 
Major  Jenkins,  the  brother  of  the  lamented  General  M. 
Jenkins,  of  South  Carolina.  After  the  fight  was  over  he 
asked  the  gallant  Page  how  he  could  be  so  unflinching, 
without  a  dodge,  amidst  such  bursting  of  bombs  and 
whispers  of  danger  all  around  him.  His  answer  was 
beautifully  characteristic,  showing  the  great  integrity  of 
his  courage :  — 

"'I  didn't  dodge,  sir,  because  I  am  so  deaf  I  didn't 
hear  them  before  their  explosion!'  A  braggadocio  would 
have  pocketed  the  compliment  as  belonging  to  his  steady 
nerves.  He  claimed  nothing  which  did  not  belong  to  him, 
and  his  courage  was  too  honest  and  real  not  to  assign 


326  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

his  apparent  indifference  to  danger  to  the  true  cause, — • 
his  deafness. 

"  But  there  was  a  much  greater  and  more  important  in* 
stance  trying  the  promptness  and  the  pluck  of  these  men. 
The  enemy  designed  its  attack  upon  Florida,  and  a  large 
fleet  left  the  mouth  of  the  Stono,  conveying  troops  for  the 
South.  It  was  uncertain  for  a  time  what  their  point  of 
destination  was,  when  a  servant  of  General  Gillmore  was 
captured  by  my  4  Rebel  Troop,'  as  it  was  called,  on  John's 
Island.  He  was  brought  in  to  me  as  a  prisoner  of  war. 
He  was  a  light  mulatto,  who  described  himself  as  the  son 
of  a  slave  freed  by  the  Barnes  family,  near  Frederick,  in 
Maryland.  He  was  General  Gillmore's  cook,  was  purvey 
ing  for  the  general's  table  on  Morris's  Island,  and  he  got 
lost  on  the  Wadmalaw.  He  was  an  exceedingly  plausible 
fellow,  and  after  a  close  and  searching  examination  pro 
fessed  to  be  wholly  ignorant  of  the  design  of  the  Stono 
expedition.  At  last  he  was  overcome  by  my  refusal  to 
receive  or  treat  him  as  a  prisoner  of  war.  What  then? 
He  was  made  to  apprehend  that  he  would  be  turned  loose, 
unmolested,  to  shift  for  himself.  Fearing  many  imaginary 
dangers,  —  that  he  would  be  shot  as  a  straggler  from  the 
enemy,  or  be  caught  and  sold  as  a  slave  and  might  never 
see  his  wife  and  family  again,  —  he  made  a  full  disclosure 
which  proved  in  the  sequel  to  be  true,  and  enabled  Gen 
eral  Beauregard  to  forward  reinforcements  to  General  Fin- 
negan.  Just  before  these  reinforcements  were  to  depart 
for  Florida,  General  Alex.  Schimmelfinnig  with  six  thou 
sand  men  crossed  over  the  bars  to  Seabrook  Island,  and 
surprising  the  picket  at  the  Haulover  from  that  island  to 
the  main,  he  advanced  up  the  Bohicket  road  and  nearly 
reached  the  headquarters  of  Major  Jenkins,  in  command 
at  that  point,  twenty-five  miles  from  Adams's  Run.  Major 
Jenkins  had  no  force  but  two  companies  of  our  brigade  and 


THE  ATTACK  ON   FLORIDA  327 

Humphreys's  troop  of  South  Carolina  cavalry.  The  enemy 
divided  into  two  columns  of  three  thousand  each,  the  one 
moving  up  the  Bohicket  road,  and  the  other  moving  to  the 
right  over  the  Mullet  Hall  Creek  which  heads  very  near 
the  left  bank  of  Bohicket.  The  three  thousand  on  the 
Bohicket  road  were  gallantly  met  by  Humphreys  and  two 
companies  of  infantry,  Jenet's  and  another,  and  were  so 
closely  fought  by  them  as  to  make  them  move  very 
cautiously,  and  to  give  time  for  Colonel  Page  to  reenforce 
Jenkins  from  John's  Island  bridge  with  a  portion  of  the 
26th,  and  this  small  force,  fighting  for  thirty-six  hours, 
saved  Jenkins's  headquarters  and  prevented  the  enemy  from 
getting  to  the  Abbepoola  road,  and  made  him,  in  fact, 
retire  past  the  defile  at  the  head  of  Mullet  Hall,  when 
I  reached  that  defile  with  reinforcements  from  the  Fifty- 
ninth,  the  Forty-sixth,  and  Thirty-fourth,  making  our  whole 
force  but  nine  hundred  men.  Seeing  that  the  three  thou 
sand  of  the  enemy  were  crossing  the  Mullet  Hall,  over  the 
temporary  bridging  of  the  channel  of  that  stream,  and  that 
they  were  trying  to  reach  the  defile  in  our  rear,  we  fell  back 
to  what  is  called  the  '  Cocked  Hat,'  a  short  distance  west  of 
the  defile  and  of  the  Abbepoola  road,  and  there  took  posi 
tion  and  opened  fire  from  two  batteries  upon  the  columns  of 
the  enemy  advancing  on  the  Bohicket  road ;  the  three  thou 
sand  on  the  Mullet  Hall  threatening  our  left.  In  half  an 
hour  after  the  fight  began,  nine  hundred  of  Colquitt's 
brigade,  bound  to  Florida,  left  the  railroad  cars  at  Church 
Flats  and  reenforced  our  command.  They  were  posted  on 
the  left  to  check  the  enemy  at  Mullet  Hall  Creek,  whilst 
our  nine  hundred  repulsed  the  attacking  columns  on  the 
Bohicket  road.  This  was  done  handsomely,  without  loss 
save  to  the  enemy.  They  fell  back  after  several  hours' 
fighting,  and  the  next  morning  we  could  see  their  strategy. 
They  expected  us  to  pursue  them  past  the  defile  at  the 


328  THE  LIFE  OF  HENKY  A.  WISE 

head  of  Mullet  Hall,  when  their  forces  on  our  left  were  to 
close  in  upon  our  rear.  We  were  not  to  be  caught  in  such 
a  snare,  and  they  were  glad  to  retire  in  the  night  as  they 
came.  For  this  the  command  was  highly  commended  by 
the  report  of  Colonel  Harris  and  the  orders  at  headquarters. 
Colquitt's  men  proceeded  the  next  day  on  their  way  to 
Florida,  and  were  soon  followed  by  our  Twenty-sixth  and 
Fifty-ninth,  to  join  Finnegan,  who  met  the  enemy  of  the 
Stono  fleet  and  conquered  them  gloriously  at  Olustee." 

Some  months  prior  to  leaving  Chaffin's  Bluff,  Wise  had 
received  a  letter  from  a  dear  friend,  Mr.  John  G.  Chapman, 
an  artist  then  residing  in  Rome,  who  wrote  that  his  son 
had  made  his  way  to  America  and  joined  the  Confederate 
army,  and  begged  Wise  to  endeavor  to  locate  his  where 
abouts,  if  possible.  After  many  unsuccessful  attempts, 
Wise  finally  succeeded  in  learning  his  address  and  getting 
into  communication  with  him,  as  a  result  of  which  young 
Chapman  came  to  Virginia  and  joined  the  Fifty-ninth  Regi 
ment  of  his  brigade.  At  the  outbreak  of  the  war,  he  had 
landed  in  New  York  and  at  first  served  in  the  western 
army  under  General  Albert  Sydney  Johnston  at  Shiloh, 
where  he  was  badly  wounded.  Conrad  W.  Chapman, 
like  his  father,  was  an  artist  of  great  talent,  which  soon 
came  to  the  knowledge  of  General  Beauregard,  who  had 
him  detailed  to  paint  the  various  fortifications  in  and 
around  Charleston.  While  serving  in  South  Carolina  he 
painted  excellent  panels,  illustrating  the  camp  scenes  and 
incidents  of  army  life,  as  well  as  the  characteristic  features 
of  the  Southern  seacoast.  In  the  spring  of  1864  he  ran 
the  blockade  from  Charleston,  carrying  these  pictures  with 
him  to  Rome,  where  fortunately  they  were  preserved,  as 
they  constitute  not  only  the  best,  but  probably  the  only 
authentic  collection  of  paintings  on  the  Confederate  side 
executed  during  the  war. 


CONBAD   W.  CHAPMAN  329 

In  March,  1864,  having  obtained  a  furlough,  Wise  re 
turned  to  Virginia  to  visit  his  family  and  look  after  his 
private  affairs.  His  home  at  Rolleston  had  been  seized 
when  Norfolk  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  enemy,  in  1862, 
and  his  wife,  at  the  time  we  write  of,  was  visiting  his 
daughter,  Mrs.  Hobson,  who  resided  at  a  plantation  called 
"Eastwood,"  some  twenty  miles  west  of  Richmond,  in 
Goochland  County,  which  was  reached  by  means  of  the 
James  River  and  Kanawha  Canal.  A  younger  daughter, 
who  accompanied  Wise  from  Richmond  on  the  trip  made 
on  the  packet  boat  to  Goochland,  thus  describes  their 
arrival,  and  the  visit  from  which  so  much  pleasure  had 
been  anticipated : l  — 

"  The  carriage  from  '  Eastwood '  was  awaiting  us.  The 
lights  from  the  country  store  glinted  on  the  vehicle,  its 
harness  and  trappings,  and  the  horses,  chilled  by  the 
nipping  air,  pranced  and  fretted  in  the  darkness,  impa 
tient  to  be  off.  It  was  but  a  moment's  wait  for  the  newly 
arrived  mail,  and  then  our  host  entering  the  carriage  with 
us,  the  team,  handled  by  'Ephraim,'  a  famous  driver, 
sprung  away  under  his  master  hand,  wheeling  us  at  an 
exhilarating  gait  to  the  Hobson  homestead.  Along  the 
public  road  beside  the  canal,  through  '  Eastwood's '  outer 
gate,  up  the  long  hill  to  the  highlands,  past  the  tobacco 
barns,  we  sped,  until  at  last  we  caught  sight  of  the  home 
stead,  all  its  windows  ablaze  with  loving  welcome,  looming 
up  in  its  grove  of  oaks,  half  a  mile  away. 

"  One  may  fancy  what  the  feelings  of  my  father  were  at 
such  a  time.  For  the  past  three  years  he  had  been  in 
active  service  in  the  field ;  first  in  West  Virginia,  then  at 
Roanoke  Island,  where  he  lost  his  first-born  son;  after 
ward  on  the  Virginia  Peninsula ;  and,  finally,  at  Charles- 

1  "  A  War-Time  Aurora  Borealis,"  by  Ellen  W.  Mayo.  Cosmopolitan, 
June,  1896. 


330  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

ton,  South  Carolina.  At  last,  with  his  furlough,  the 
prospect  of  a  short  period  of  peace  and  domestic  quiet 
seemed  fairly  to  open  up  to  him.  Mr.  Plumer  Hobson, 
our  host  and  his  son-in-law,  had  been  prevented  by  ill  health 
from  entering  the  army.  His  inability  to  volunteer  was 
a  great  mortification  and  distress  to  him.  As  if  to  make 
up,  in  another  form,  for  the  military  service  he  could  not 
render,  he  devoted  himself  and  his  means  throughout  the 
war  in  every  way  possible  to  charity  and  hospitality.  It 
was,  therefore,  with  peculiar  satisfaction  that  he  greeted 
us  now,  showing  by  every  means  in  his  power  his  desire 
to  make  our  visit  as  happy  as  possible. 

"  We  noticed,  as  we  drove  along  in  the  starlit  night, 
that  the  northern  sky  was  aflame  with  what  we  all  sup 
posed  to  be  the  Aurora  Borealis;  but  our  thoughts  were 
too  much  concentrated  upon  the  lights  blinking  at  us  from 
the  '  Eastwood '  grove  to  pay  much  attention  to  the  lights 
in  the  heavens.  Wide  apart  flew  the  yard  gates  for  us  as 
we  reached  them ;  and  wider  still  the  great  doors  of  the 
mansion  house,  as  the  wheels  ceased  their  grinding  in  the 
gravel  before  the  house.  Joyous  faces  peered  out  into 
the  night.  Merry,  happy  greetings  met  us  on  the  thresh 
old.  Within,  the  warmth  of  great  wood  fires,  and  the 
good  cheer  of  a  delicious  supper,  banished  from  our  party 
every  thought  of  war.  What  a  feast  it  was !  Coffee  from 
Mrs.  Seddon's ;  sugar  from  Mrs.  Stanard's ;  sorghum  from 
somebody  else.  The  cook  had  made  the  biscuits  so  light 
that  they  almost  flew  out  of  the  plates ;  and  the  cow,  in 
honor  of  our  coming,  had  given  down  nothing  but  cream. 
The  good  old  general,  as  he  looked  over  this  array  of  luxu 
ries,  bade  good-by,  for  a  time  at  least,  to  camp  life,  tin  plates, 
canteens,  Nassau  bacon,  sweet-potato,  coffee,  rice, '  Hoppin'- 
John,'  and  '  Hoppin'- Jinny,'  4cush,'  and  all  the  horrible 
makeshifts  of  food  he  had  endured  for  months  at  the  front. 


A   WAR-TIME   AURORA  BOREALIS  331 

"  If  I  enjoyed  the  snowy  pillows  awaiting,  what  must  he 
have  felt?  For  the  first  time  in  many  months  he  tucked 
himself  away,  at  midnight,  in  a  Christian  bed,  with  linen, 
lavender-scented  sheets,  and  warm,  soft  blankets,  to  dream 
of  days  gone  by,  when,  at  his  own  home  by  the  sea,  in 
time  of  peace,  with  oysters,  terrapin,  and  canvasbacks  for 
the  feast,  judges  and  statesmen  and  even  presidents  had 
been  his  guests.  He  sank  to  rest,  in  fancy  hearing  the 
sound  of  the  salt  waves  at  his  home,  and  the  sighing  of 
the  winds  through  the  seaside  pines.  I,  happy  and  con 
tented  beyond  expression,  lost  consciousness  wondering 
what  we  would  have  for  breakfast.  Before  us  all  stretched 
a  vista  of  thirty  days  of  peace !  No  matter  what  might  be 
beyond. 

"I  dreamed.  For  a  long  time  I  glided  upon  smooth 
waters,  watching  ever-changing  landscapes  of  beauty.  I 
was  not  on  the  canal  nor  on  a  canal-boat.  It  was  a  beau 
tiful  lake,  a  painted  boat  with  snowy  sails,  and  I  was  ac 
companied  by  gay  companions  and  merry  music.  Then  of 
a  sudden  the  scene  changed.  I  was  back  on  the  miserable 
packet.  It  was  dark.  I  was  in  the  stuffy  cabin.  A  fear 
ful  thumping  was  overhead.  A  drunken  man  on  deck 
was  trying  to  burst  open  my  trunk  and  throw  it  over 
board.  I  awoke.  The  pounding  continued.  It  was  some 
one  beating  on  the  oaken  doors  of  the  house  and  loudly 
calling  for  the  general.  Dressing  hurriedly,  the  family 
was  soon  collected  in  the  hallway  listening  with  bated 
breath.  A  soldier  of  the  general's  command  had  come  up 
with  us  on  furlough.  His  home  was  some  miles  beyond 
us  in  the  back  country.  He  had  ridden  thither  and  solved 
the  mystery  of  the  Aurora  Borealis ;  for  right  around  his 
home  he  had  come  upon  the  bivouac  of  the  raiding  party 
of  Dahlgren.  Even  as  he  sped  back  to  warn  us  he  had 
heard  '  boots  and  saddles '  sounded.  He  had  ridden 


332  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

rapidly  to  tell  his  dear  old  general  of  the  danger;  and, 
at  the  moment  he  was  speaking,  the  enemy,  according 
to  all  reasonable  calculation,  was  coming  on  the  same 
road  by  which  he  had  arrived,  and  not  over  two  or  three 
miles  behind  him. 

"  The  news  chilled  every  heart  among  us  with  the  sense 
of  imminent  peril.  The  ashes  on  the  hearth,  where  last 
night's  revelry  was  held,  lay  dead.  Our  dream  of  peace 
and  rest  was  over.  The  dogs  of  war  were  once  more  bay 
ing  on  the  hot  scent,  and  we  were  the  quarry  pursued.  If 
the  men  escaped  with  their  lives,  they  would  be  lucky. 
The  women  and  children,  in  another  hour,  would  be 
defenceless,  at  the  mercy  of  ignorant  slaves  and  hostile 
soldiery.  There  was  hurrying  for  the  stables.  In  an  in 
credibly  short  time  'Pulaski,'  the  blind  war-horse  of  the 
general's  dead  son,  and  4  Lucy  Washington,'  Mr.  Hobson's 
thoroughbred  riding-mare,  were  at  the  door.  They  were 
not  a  moment  too  soon.  But  for  an  episode  they  would 
have  been  too  late.  The  two  plantations  adjoining  ours 
on  the  west  were  owned  by  Mr.  James  M.  Morson  and 
Hon.  James  A.  Seddon,  Secretary  of  War.  Dahlgren's 
original  purpose  is  said  to  have  been  to  cross  the  James 
River  at  either  Jude's  Ferry,  which  was  on  the  Morson 
place  just  above,  or  at  Mannakin  Ferry,  three  miles  below 
us,  and  to  approach  Richmond  by  the  south  bank  of  the 
James.  Whether  it  was  or  not,  his  force  entered  the 
Morson  and  Seddon  plantations  instead  of  coming  straight 
on  to  4  Eastwood,'  and  there  lost  considerable  time  firing 
buildings  and  appropriating  horses. 

"  Mr.  Seddon's  house  was  in  full  view,  not  a  third  of  a 
mile  away.  It  was  by  this  time  broad  daylight,  and  from 
the  portico  where  I  stood,  the  troopers  of  Dahlgren  were 
plainly  visible,  galloping  about  the  stables  and  barns  and 
setting  fire  to  the  buildings,  the  smoke  from  which  already 


A   WAR-TIME   AURORA   BOREALIS  333 

began  to  rise.  Of  course,  the  first  thing  the  Union  sol 
diers  learned  from  the  negroes  was  that  General  Wise,  the 
man  who  hung  John  Brown,  was  at  '  Eastwood.'  For 
'Eastwood,'  then,  they  started  in  full  career,  just  as  my 
father  and  Mr.  Hobson  rode  out  of  the  '  Eastwood '  yard, 
making  for  a  heavy  body  of  woods  lying  in  the  direction 
of  Richmond.  My  father  knew  the  ground  thoroughly, 
and  parted  from  us  bidding  us  feel  no  apprehension. 
4  For  if,'  said  he,  '  I  can  gain  the  woods  before  they  over 
haul  me,  I  have  no  fear  of  my  capture,  or  failure  to  reach 
Richmond  in  time  to  give  warning.'  And  away  they 
went,  plunging  across  the  ploughed  fields,  just  as,  from  the 
Seddon  place  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  farm,  the  enemy's 
troopers  came  galloping,  hundreds  of  them,  flying  like 
birds,  it  seemed  to  me,  —  fences  and  closed  gates  offering 
no  obstacle  to  their  headlong  rush.  '  Have  no  fear,'  father 
had  said,  as  he  rode  away.  Oh,  no.  Of  course,  I  had 
none!  There  I  stood,  almost  frantic,  as  a  Union  soldier 
dashed  up,  with  drawn  revolver,  and  demanded  to  know 
where  the  man  was  who  hung  John  Brown.  I  can  see 
him  as  plainly  now  as  then :  his  flea-bitten  gray  horse,  his 
McClellan  saddle,  his  very  expression  as  he  sat  there 
sidewise,  talking  so  insultingly.  I  see  the  flashing  eye 
and  hear  the  voice  commanding  me  to  tell  the  truth.  I 
clutched  at  the  child  beside  me,  and  even  as  I  spoke  I 
could  see  out  of  the  corner  of  my  eye,  over  the  trees 
which  concealed  him  from  the  trooper,  my  father  dis 
appearing  in  the  woods.  I  declared  most  solemnly  (God 
forgive  me)  that  my  father  was  in  Charleston,  South 
Carolina.  Anxiety  and  excitement  excluded  fear  of  God 
or  man.  As  a  reward,  I  was  informed  that  I  lied,  the 
trooper  adding  that  he  would  capture  him  if  he  had  to 

chase  him  to .     4  Take  your white  head  into  the 

house,'  said  he,  threateningly,  and  I  gladly  accepted  his  in- 


334  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

vitation.  From  the  upper  windows  I  beheld  the  handsome 
barns  of  4  Dover '  and  4  Sabot  Hill '  in  flames.  About  the 
stables  the  troopers  were  shifting  saddles  from  their  own 
jaded  horses  to  Mr.  Hobson's  animals.  Ephraim,  inflamed 
with  liquor,  was  marched  hither  and  thither  under  cover 
of  pistols  and  required  to  deliver  everything  under  his 
care  ;  and  poor  '  Bob,'  who  had  been  working  on  fortifica 
tions  about  Richmond,  when  asked  about  them,  exclaimed, 
4  Lawd,  master !  Dey  is  a  hundred  and  f ortyfications  aroun' 
dat  place.' 

"  Their  stay  with  us  was  short.  They  took  all  our  horses, 
Ephraim  and  several  other  slaves ;  but,  on  the  whole,  we 
fared  much  better  than  our  neighbors.  Nothing  at  '  East 
wood  '  was  burned ;  and  after  the  raiding  party  went  to 
pieces  below  Richmond,  most  of  the  horses  were  recovered. 
Poor  father,  with  his  knowledge  of  the  topography  of  the 
country,  had  no  trouble  in  reaching  Richmond,  by  shorter 
routes  than  and  far  in  advance  of  the  Dahlgren  party. 
Going  directly  to  the  War  Department,  he  with  great  diffi 
culty  convinced  Secretary  Seddon  of  the  real  situation. 
The  Department  had  no  warning  whatever  of  the  raid,  and 
Mr.  Seddon  seemed  utterly  incredulous  at  first.  But  once 
convinced,  the  local  reserves  under  Colonel  McAnerny 
were  called  out  and  met  and  repulsed  Dahlgren  about 
five  miles  above  Richmond.  The  collision  took  place 
about  dusk.  The  cavalry  charging  the  infantry  line  failed 
to  observe  an  old  ice-house  in  their  front.  Into  this  a 
man  on  a  flea-bitten  gray  horse  plunged  headlong.  I 
have  never  ascertained  definitely  whether  he  was  the 
gentleman  I  met  that  morning  still  pursuing  my  father 
in  the  direction  then  indicated.  Between  our  place  and 
Richmond  was  Mannakintown,  with  important  coal-pits, 
ironworks,  and  a  ferry.  Opinions  differ  as  to  whether 
Jude's  Ferry  or  Mannakin  Ferry  was  the  original  objec- 


A   WAR-TIME  AURORA  BOREALIS  335 

tive  point  of  Dahlgren.  He  crossed  the  river  at  neither 
place,  but  held  to  the  north  bank.  The  fate  of  the  raid  is 
known,  and  I  will  not  repeat  it.  The  orders  found  on 
Dahlgren's  body  have  gone  into  our  historical  archives. 
The  bitterness  of  those  days  has  passed  away.  Two  days 
after  the  visit  of  Dahlgren,  father  and  Mr.  Hobson  came 
ambling  quietly  through  the  farm  from  the  direction  of 
Richmond,  rising  in  their  stirrups  now  and  then  to  observe 
carefully  what  the  angry  little  war-cloud  had  swept  away 
in  its  passage ;  and,  as  the  dear  old  fellow  resumed  the  en 
joyment  of  his  interrupted  furlough,  with  a  merry  allusion 
to  his  narrow  escape,  we  all  felt  grateful  to  God  that  it 
was  no  worse,  and  that  we  were  left  unharmed." 


CHAPTER   XIX 

ORDERED  BACK  TO  VIRGINIA.  FIGHT  AT  NOTTOWAY  BRIDGE. 
THE  BATTLE  OF  DREWRY'S  BLUFF.  THE  FIRST  DAYJS  AT 
TACKS  ON  PETERSBURG 

ON  the  3d  day  of  May,  1864,  an  order  was  issued  reliev 
ing  Wise  from  duty  in  the  department  of  South  Carolina, 
Georgia,  and  Florida,  and  directing  him  to  proceed  with 
his  brigade  by  rail  to  Richmond  to  take  part  in  the  defence  of 
the  Confederate  capital.  The  Fifty-ninth  Regiment,  which, 
under  Colonel  William  B.  Tabb,  was  in  advance,  encoun 
tered  a  force  of  from  2500  to  3000  Federal  cavalry  of 
Kautz's  command,  with  six  pieces  of  artillery,  at  Nottoway 
Bridge.  The  last-named  officer  was  engaged  in  destroying 
the  lines  of  communication  in  south-side  Virginia.  Tabb, 
who  had  at  his  disposal  600  men,  had  taken  up  a  position 
at  the  southern  end  of  the  bridge  and  stubbornly  resisted 
the  approach  of  the  enemy;  but  finding  that  the  latter  had 
turned  his  right  flank  and  gained  his  rear,  he  fell  back  to 
a  small  redoubt,  about  300  yards  from  the  end  of  the 
bridge  on  the  north  side  of  the  stream.  Although  this 
movement  involved  the  loss  of  the  bridge,  which  was 
quickly  fired  by  the  enemy,  the  force  under  Tabb  was 
able  to  repulse  the  attack  in  front  of  the  redoubt,  and 
the  assailants  were  driven  back,  leaving  their  dead  and 
wounded  on  the  field.  The  brigade  reached  Petersburg 
without  further  interruption,  and  was  assigned  to  the 
command  of  General  Whiting. 

336 


ORDERED   BACK   TO   VIRGINIA  337 

Wise  thus  describes  the  services  performed  by  himself 
and  men  at  this  period :  - 

"  General  Lee  was  at  that  time  confronted  by  Grant  at 
the  Rapidan.  General  W.  H.  C.  Whiting  was  placed  in 
command  of  the  defences  of  Petersburg,  embracing  the 
line  of  heavy  fixed  batteries  supported  by  two  small  local 
battalions,  about  150  militia,  one  Georgia  battalion,  and 
our  brigade  of  infantry. 

"  General  Beauregard  took  his  position  with  about  8000 
effective  men  at  Drewry's  Bluff,  and  all  these  forces  were 
confronted  by  Butler's  army  of  the  James  intrenched  at 
City  Point  and  at  Cobb's  in  Hewlett's  Neck.  On  the 
14th  of  May,  1864,  he  presented  his  plan  of  strategy  to 
the  War  Department,  at  the  head  of  which  then  were  Mr. 
Seddon  and  General  Bragg.  Lee  had  about  45,000  effec 
tive  forces ;  Beauregard  about  15,000 ;  and  the  plan  he 
presented  was  for  Lee  to  fall  back  upon  the  outer  defences 
of  Richmond  and  send  to  him,  Beauregard,  15,000  reen- 
forcements,  making,  with  his  own,  30,000  men  with  which 
to  attack  and  conquer  Butler,  gain  City  Point,  cross  the 
James,  and  attack  Grant  on  the  left  and  rear,  whilst  Lee 
should  attack  him  in  front.  Thus  Grant  would  have  been 
cut  off  from  the  James  below  Richmond,  Petersburg  would 
have  been  relieved,  and  Grant's  force  of  about  120,000  then 
could  have  been  assailed  front,  flank,  and  rear  by  60,000 
men  under  the  two  choicest  generals  of  the  Confederate 
army.  This  plan,  unfortunately,  was  rejected  by  the 
President,  and  immediately  thereafter  General  Bragg  sent 
to  General  Whiting  an  order  saying  that  General  Lee  was 
pressed  very  hard  by  Grant,  and  needed  all  the  reenforce- 
ments  which  could  be  forwarded  to  him  to  save  Richmond ; 
and  the  defence  of  the  capital  being  much  more  important 
than  that  of  Petersburg,  he  was  ordered  with  all  despatch 
to  report  with  all  his  available  forces  at  Richmond.  This 


338  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

order  was  submitted  to  me,  his  second  in  command,  by 
General  Whiting,  for  my  opinion  as  to  its  execution.  It 
was  signed  by  General  Bragg  officially.  I  read  it  with 
care,  and  unequivocally  gave  the  opinion  that  it  should 
not  be  obeyed,  for  the  reason  that  to  abandon  Petersburg 
was  to  abandon  Drewry's  Bluff,  and  to  abandon  the  latter 
was  to  abandon  Richmond.  General  Whiting  declared 
that  that  was  his  own  opinion,  and  ordered  me  at  once  to 
make  the  best  preparation  for  the  defence  of  Petersburg 
to  the  last  extremity  in  my  power.  I  state  these  facts 
because  it  has  been  denied  that  General  Bragg  ever  issued 
such  an  order.  It  was  read  and  considered  by  another 
besides  General  Whiting  and  myself.  In  two  hours  from 
the  time  it  was  received,  and  whilst  I  was  issuing  orders 
for  the  defence  of  Petersburg,  General  Whiting  again  sent 
for  me  to  wait  on  him  at  his  quarters.  The  moment  I 
reported  he  handed  me  an  order  to  him  from  General 
Beauregard  at  Drewry's  Bluff,  to  the  front  of  which  point 
Butler  had  advanced.  The  substance  of  that  order  was 
that  he,  Whiting,  was  with  all  his  available  forces  on  both 
sides  the  Appomattox,  Martin's  and  Wise's  Brigades,  num 
bering  in  all  about  five  thousand  men,  to  cross  the  Appomattox 
and  take  the  road  across  Campbell's  Bridge  by  the  coal  pits, 
and  join  his  right  before  daybreak  the  next  morning,  when 
he  would  attack  Butler.  In  a  few  hours  after  this  order 
was  received,  another  order  from  Beauregard  changing 
this  came,  ordering  (J.  G.)  Martin's  and  Wise's  Brigades 
to  be  at  Dunlop's,  on  the  Richmond  and  Petersburg  turn 
pike,  before  daybreak  the  next  morning,  and  thence  at 
daybreak  to  move  to  the  sound  of  Beauregard's  guns. 

"  It  is  lamentable  to  add  that,  owing  to  causes  which 
affect  the  reputation  of  a  brave  and  accomplished  Confed 
erate  commander,  who  died  nobly  in  battle  afterward, 
General  Whiting  did  not  move  as  promptly  as  he  might. 


THE   CHARGE  AT   HOWLETT'S   NECK  339 

The  two  brigades  were  at  Dunlop's  before  daybreak,  and 
there  awaited  his  orders  until  more  than  an  hour  by  sun. 
They  were  moved  then,  and  found  the  reserve  of  the  enemy 
under  General  Terry  in  barricade  at  the  Walthall  Railroad 
junction  with  the  Petersburg  Railroad  and  the  turnpike. 
Martin's  Brigade  was  on  the  right  and  Wise's  on  the  left, 
crossing  the  turnpike  on  which  the  enemy  had  thrown  up 
their  works.  They  were  immediately  charged,  driven 
from  their  breastworks,  across  Bakehouse  Creek  up  the 
hill  to  their  artillery,  and  in  their  flight  their  guns  barely 
escaped  capture.  All  their  provisions  were  captured,  and 
the  brigades  were  passing  on  to  the  rear  of  the  army 
retreating  before  Beauregard,  when  they  were  halted  by 
General  Whiting  and  ordered  to  fall  back.  But  for  this 
sad  hindrance,  the  causes  of  which  were  fully  reported, 
the  victory  of  Beauregard  would  have  been  one  of  the 
most  signal  and  decisive  during  the  war.  As  it  was,  it 
was  very  decided  in  capturing  six  thousand l  prisoners  and 
in  shutting  Butler  up,  as  General  Grant  said,  in  Hewlett's 
Neck,  'like  a  fly  in  a  bottle.'  On  the  morning  of  the 
17th  the  two  brigades  joined  Beauregard's  army,  and  from 
the  18th  to  the  28th  of  May,  for  ten  days,  there  was  heavy 
fighting  on  the  whole  picket  lines,  one-third  of  our  brigade 
being  required  at  a  time  to  picket  its  front,  making  every 
day  almost  a  general  battle.  At  last  the  order  came  to 
charge  and  take  the  enemy's  outer  line  at  Howlett's,  and 
it  was  captured  from  Ware  Bottom  Church  on  the  James 
to  the  front  of  Cobb's  on  the  Appomattox.2  The  part 

1  Wise  was  evidently  misinformed  on  this  point,  as  the  prisoners  cap 
tured  did  not  number  more  than  one-third  of  this. 

2  The  late  Colonel  Carter  Braxton  of  Newport  News,  Virginia,  who 
commanded  the  battalion  of  artillery  on  the  Hewlett  line  occupied  by  the 
Wise  Brigade  in  the  early  summer  of  1864,  used  to  laugh  heartily  over  the 
following  story,  which  he  was  fond  of  relating :  — 

One  day  he  saw  a  number  of  Yankees  in  his  front  and  was  about  to 


340  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

borne  by  Martin's  and  Wise's  Brigades  upon  the  enemy 
in  their  front  was  without  failure  and  a  perfect  success ; 
six  hundred  of  the  Wise  Brigade,  under  that  perfect  tacti 
cian,  Lieutenant-Colonel  J.  C.  Council,  of  the  Twenty- 
sixth,  led  the  charge,  supported  by  Martin,  who  was 
supported  in  a  third  line  by  the  remaining  portions  of 
Wise's  Brigade.  The  six  hundred  carried  the  front  before 
either  brigade  came  up ;  so  rapid  and  so  undaunted  was 
this  charge  of  the  six  hundred  it  was  Balaklava-like.  This 
charge  was  made  in  open  field  for  one-half  a  mile,  under 
110  guns,  against  a  full  line  of  infantry  in  parapet.  The 
men,  though  falling  '  like  leaves  in  Vallombrosa,'  moved 
steadily  up  under  the  point-blank  fire  until  within  ten  or 
twenty  paces,  when  the  enemy  threw  down  their  guns  and 
cried  for  quarter.  The  reply  was  '  too  late  ! '  4  too  late  ! ' 
and  the  havoc  which  followed  was  appalling.  The  six 
hundred  passed  beyond  the  line  taken  and  had  to  be 
recalled.  No  more  could  be  done  but  hold  that  line. 
After  this  line  was  captured  and  settled  firmly,  General 
Wise  was  sent  with  but  one  of  his  regiments,  the  Forty- 
sixth,  and  a  Georgia  battalion  to  support  the  local  forces 
on  the  lines  of  Petersburg.  His  whole  force  was  800 
men,  including  113  militia  under  the  gallant  Colonel  F.  H. 
Archer,  to  defend  a  line  of  six  and  a  half  miles.  Alas ! 
when  he  came  to  count  his  brigade,  numbering  2400  men 
on  the  16th  of  May,  he  found  the  roster  reduced  to  1350. 
In  the  charge  at  Hewlett's  the  Ben  McCullock  Rangers, 

open  on  them,  when  Wise  told  him  not  to  fire,  and  insisted  that  they  were 
some  of  his  men.  Braxton  accordingly  did  not  fire,  but  still  claimed  that 
they  belonged  to  the  enemy's  force.  Wise  then  said,  "  Wait,  Colonel,  I 
will  find  out,"  and  proceeded  to  climb  over  the  breastworks  and  advanced 
close  to  the  body  of  men  referred  to,  they  allowing  him  to  get  tolerably 
close  before  firing  on  him.  Wise  turned  around  deliberately  and  called 
to  Colonel  Braxton,  "  Open  on  them,  Colonel,  they  are  not  our  men."  This 
Braxton  did  successfully  and  drove  them  off,  Wise  in  the  meantime  having 
walked  back  into  the  works  without  getting  hurt. 


DEFENCE   OF   PETERSBURG  341 

the  best  scouts  of  the  army,  were  reduced  from  seventy- 
four  to  thirty-eight,  and  the  Accomack  Company  from 
seventy-two  to  thirty-seven." 

By  a  special  order  issued  June  1,  Wise  was  detached 
from  his  brigade,  and  directed  to  assume  command  of  the 
forces  in  the  district  lying  between  the  James  and  Roan- 
oke  rivers,  exclusive  of  the  defences  immediately  around 
Richmond  on  the  south  side  of  the  James.  This  involved, 
in  short,  the  defence  of  Petersburg,  the  natural  gateway 
to  Richmond,  which  was  soon  to  be  the  objective  point 
of  Grant's  invading  columns.  General  William  Farrar 
Smith  relates 1  that  he  was  once  in  company  with  General 
John  Newton,  a  Virginian  by  birth,  who,  placing  his  finger 
upon  the  map  at  the  point  designated  Petersburg,  remarked 
"  There  is  Richmond,"  and  the  former  has  truly  observed, 
in  this  connection,  that  the  more  the  map  of  Virginia  is 
studied,  the  clearer  will  this  truth  appear.  The  Petersburg 
Railroad  running  south  from  that  place,  together  with  the 
South-side  Road  to  Lynchburg,  and  the  Danville  Railroad, 
near  by,  constituted  the  main  arteries  by  means  of  which 
Richmond  and  the  Confederate  forces  were  furnished  with 
supplies,  and  with  these  lines  in  possession  of  the  enemy, 
the  fall  of  Richmond  must  soon  follow.  This  fact  was 
soon  to  dawn  upon  General  Grant  himself,  who  having 
sacrificed,  between  the  Rapidan  and  James,  the  lives  of 
almost  as  many  Union  soldiers  as  Lee  had  men  in  his 
army,  realized  that  with  the  James  River  open  as  far  up 
as  City  Point,  and  with  that  place  as  a  base  of  supplies, 
it  was  more  practicable  to  proceed  against  Richmond  from 
the  rear  than  in  front. 

Although  it  was  not  until  after  the  slaughter  at  Cold 
Harbor  that  Grant  began  his  crossing  of  the  James,  yet, 

1  Unpublished  address  delivered  before  the  Military  Historical  Society 
of  Massachusetts. 


342  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.   WISE 

in  the  meanwhile,  Petersburg  was  menaced  by  the  force 
under  Butler,  from  whose  front  Beauregard  had  been 
ordered  to  withdraw  a  part  of  his  command  —  Hoke's 
Division — to  reen force  Lee  on  the  north  side  of  the 
James.  Butler,  having  resolved  upon  a  movement  against 
Petersburg,  issued  orders  on  the  8th  of  June  directing 
Major-General  Gillmore,  with  a  large  body  of  infantry, 
accompanied  by  thirteen  hundred  cavalry,  under  General 
August  V.  Kautz,  to  cross  the  Appomattox,  by  means  of 
a  pontoon  bridge  at  the  Point  of  Rocks,  and  proceed 
against  the  city  by  the  various  roadways  leading  thither 
from  that  direction.  Butler  apparently  was  well  informed 
as  to  the  weakness  of  the  force  stationed  there  and  cor 
rectly  surmised  that  a  prompt,  vigorous  movement  would 
have  been  crowned  with  success.  To  defend  a  line  ex 
tending  from  the  Appomattox  to  the  Jerusalem  plank  road, 
nearly  six  miles  in  length,  Wise  had  one  regiment  of  his 
brigade,  the  Forty-sixth,  under  Colonel  Randolph  Harri 
son,  Sturdivant's  Battery  of  artillery,  Hood's  and  Batte's 
battalions,  and  a  miscellaneous  force  of  infantry,  composed 
of  old  men  and  boys,  together  with  a  part  of  the  Seventh 
Regiment  of  cavalry,  under  Colonel  Taliaf erro,  —  in  all 
about  900  infantry,  125  artillery,  and  150  effective  cavalry, 
—  the  whole  amounting  to  less  than  1200  men.  General 
Butler's  statement  as  to  "  the  grave  and  the  cradle  being 
robbed  in  about  equal  proportions"  to  compose  the  force 
opposed  to  him,  was  not  only  true,  but  the  jails  and  hos 
pitals  were  in  like  manner  required  to  yield  up  their 
quotas. 

The  patriotic  old  men  and  boys  of  the  town  had  organ 
ized  themselves  into  a  reserve  force,  under  the  command 
of  the  gallant  Colonel  Fletcher  H.  Archer,  and  had  been 
well  drilled  for  the  defence  of  the  Cockade  City.  Colonel 
Archer  relates  a  story  of  how  when  Wise  came  to  Peters- 


THE   FIRST   DAY'S   ATTACKS  343 

burg  to  take  command,  he  rode  out  to  inspect  the  lines, 
and  appearing  at  the  camp  of  the  reserves  inquired  for  the 
commanding  officer,  who  happened  to  be  absent  at  the 
time.  He  was  told  by  the  adjutant  that  the  commandant 
had  gone  to  Petersburg.  "  Yes,"  replied  he,  "  and  if  the 
Yankees  were  to  come,  you  would  all  be  there  in  less  time 
than  it  would  take  a  cannon-ball  to  reach  there."  But 
the  reserves  were  to  give  a  different  account  of  them 
selves  a  few  days  later  on.  Early  on  the  morning  of  the 
9th,  Gillmore  crossed  over  the  Appomattox,  a  part  of  his 
infantry,  under  Colonel  Joseph  R.  Hawley,  advancing,  by 
way  of  the  City  Point  road,  a  similar  force,  under  General 
Edward  W.  Hinks,  proceeding  along  the  Jordan's  Point 
road,  while  the  cavalry  under  Kautz  moved  in  a  southerly 
direction  from  the  river,  in  order  to  swing  around  and 
attack  the  Confederate  right.  The  whole  force  under 
Gillmore  numbered  upward  of  forty-five  hundred  men, 
and  had  they  been  handled  with  intelligence  and  vigor, 
the  capture  of  Petersburg  would  have  been  effected  be 
yond  a  reasonable  doubt. 

The  Confederate  pickets  were  driven  in  at  an  early 
hour,  together  with  the  handful  of  cavalry  under  Colonel 
Taliaferro,  but  on  this  occasion,  as  subsequently  during 
the  attacks  on  Petersburg,  the  Confederates,  by  a  seem 
ingly  reckless  use  of  their  scant  force  in  front  of  the  breast 
works,  no  doubt  deceived  the  enemy  as  to  the  number  of 
men  stationed  behind  them.  Mr.  Ropes 1  has  laid  consid 
erable  emphasis  on  this  point,  in  treating  of  the  siege  of 
Petersburg,  and  upon  the  day  of  Gillmore's  attack  many 
of  Wise's  men  followed  this  plan.  Owing  to  the  longer 
distance  which  he  was  compelled  to  traverse,  Kautz  did 
not  reach  the  Confederate  lines  until  some  hours  after 

1  Address  by  John  C.  Ropes,  Esq.,  on  first  day's  attacks  on  Petersburg. 
Unpublished  manuscripts  Military  Historical  Society  of  Massachusetts. 


344  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

Hawley  and  Hinks,  who,  either  on  account  of  not  having 
heard  from  the  former,  or  from  the  appearance  of  the 
redans  in  front  of  them,  did  not  make  a  combined  assault 
on  the  works.  The  following  passage  from  a  narrative, 
written  by  Wise,  describes  the  main  events  of  the  day :  — 

"They  pressed  hard  upon  the  left,  for  three  or  four 
hours,  and  then  suddenly  attacked  the  militia  on  my  ex 
treme  right,  with  a  detachment  numbering  one  thousand,1 
which  were  handsomely  received  by  Archer;  but  they 
broke  through  his  line,  one  half  of  them  taking  the  road 
into  Petersburg,  and  the  other  the  road  leading  to  Bland- 
ford.  Graham's  Battery  accidentally,  at  the  City  Water 
Works,  met  the  first,  and  a  curious  force  drove  back  the 
latter.  I  had  detailed  all  who  could  possibly  do  momen 
tary  duty  out  of  the  hospitals,  calling  them  the  ;  Patients ' ; 
and  from  the  jail  and  guard-houses  all  the  prisoners,  call 
ing  them  the  '  Penitents ' ;  and  the  two  companies  of 
4  Patients '  and  4  Penitents '  moved  out  on  the  Bland- 
ford  road,  while  I  advanced  with  three  companies  of  the 
Forty-sixth  from  our  left ;  and  the  enemy  on  that  road,  see 
ing  the  head  of  the  column  of  '  P.  P.'s '  advancing  in  their 
front,  and  my  three  companies  bearing  on  their  right  flank, 
wheeled  to  the  right-about  at  once  and  retired;  and  Gra 
ham's  Battery  repulsed  the  other  party  advancing  upon  the 
city.  This  was  done  with  a  loss  of  thirteen  killed  and  a 
few  wounded,  of  the  militia.  Petersburg  was  thus  barely 
saved  on  the  9th ;  and  the  defence  was  so  critical  that  I 
demanded  additional  forces,  and  General  Beauregard  at 
once  reenforced  my  command  with  my  Twenty-sixth  Vir 
ginia,  and  nine  companies  of  the  Thirty-fourth."  2 

It  should  also  be  stated  in  this  connection  that  the  timely 

1  This  was  the  cavalry  force  under  Kautz  which  attacked  on  the  Jeru 
salem  plank  road  about  noon. 

2  Roman's  "Life  of  Beauregard,"  Vol.  II.  page  224. 


THE   FIRST  DAY'S   ATTACKS  345 

arrival  of  General  James  Dearing,  with  his  regiment  of 
cavalry,  about  the  time  that  the  outer  works  were  carried 
by  Kautz,  materially  aided  in  saving  the  day,  as  his  com 
mand  were  promptly  hurried  through  the  city  by  their 
efficient  commander,  and  their  appearance  near  the  city 
limits  followed  by  a  charge  upon  the  enemy  probably 
induced  the  Federals  to  withdraw. 

The  armies  of  Lee  and  Grant  continued  to  face  each 
other  at  Cold  Harbor  until  the  12th  of  June,  when  the 
latter  began  his  movements  to  the  south  side  of  the  James. 
On  that  night  the  Eighteenth  Federal  Corps,  under  General 
W.  F.  (Baldy)  Smith,  marched  to  the  White  House  on  the 
Pamunkey,  where  they  embarked  aboard  transports  for 
Bermuda  Hundred,  at  which  place  they  arrived  during 
the  afternoon  and  night  of  the  14th.  To  Smith's  Corps, 
supplemented  by  twenty-five  hundred  cavalry  under  Kautz, 
was  assigned  the  duty  of  making  the  initial  attack  on 
Petersburg,  which  it  was  proposed  should  begin  early  on 
the  morning  of  the  15th.  The  number  of  troops  under 
the  command  of  General  Smith  on  that  date  exceeded, 
according  to  the  estimates  of  Generals  Grant  and  Butler, 
seventeen  thousand,  although  General  Smith  himself  says 
that  his  infantry  barely  aggregated  ten  thousand  effective 
men,  which,  with  the  cavalry  under  Kautz,  would  make  a 
total  of  about  twelve  thousand  five  hundred  of  all  arms. 
At  this  time,  Wise  had  for  the  defence  of  Petersburg  an 
effective  force  of  only  twenty-two  hundred  men,  including 
his  Twenty-sixth  and  Thirty-fourth  regiments,  which  had 
been  returned  to  him  by  Beauregard  as  previously  stated, 
along  with  a  small  cavalry  command  under  General  James 
Dearing.  The  line  of  works  defended  by  the  Confederates 
during  the  first  attack  on  Petersburg,  and  known  as  the 
Dimmock  line,  ran  in  a  direction  from  the  Appomattox  a 
little  south  of  east,  over  low  ground,  to  the  City  Point 


346  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

Railroad,  "and  then,  turning  sharply,  mounted  the  high 
ground  and  ran  along  a  series  of  crests,  for  about  a  mile 
and  a  half  from  Battery  No.  5  to  Battery  No.  12  " ;  when 
it  was  drawn  back,  in  a  semicircular  form,  to  a  point  on 
the  river  west  of  the  city.  According  to  General  R.  E. 
Colston,  who  was  present  and  gallantly  assisted  in  the 
defence  against  Gillmore's  attack,  these  redans  differed 
entirely  from  the  shortened  and  formidable  works  which 
were  later  on  constructed  by  General  Lee's  army.  "  With 
the  exception  of  a  few  lunettes  and  redoubts  at  the  most 
commanding  positions,"  wrote  that  officer,  "they  were 
barely  marked  out,  and  a  horseman  could  ride  over  them 
without  difficulty  almost  everywhere,  as  I  myself  had 
done,  day  after  day  for  weeks,  just  before  the  fight."  l 
On  the  morning  of  June  15th  Wise's  troops  were  posted 
from  Battery  No.  1,  on  the  Appomattox,  constituting  his 
left,  to  Butterworth's  Bridge,  on  the  Jerusalem  plank 
road,  which  allowed  but  one  man  to  every  four  and  one- 
half  yards.  From  the  bridge  to  the  river  on  his  right 
flank,  a  distance  of  nearly  five  miles,  the  lines  were  with 
out  troops  to  man  them,  and  a  well-executed  movement 
by  a  cavalry  regiment  of  the  enemy,  in  this  quarter,  would 
have  rolled  up  the  Confederate  right  flank  during  the  first 
day's  attacks  on  Petersburg ;  for  though  Dearing's  cavalry 
were  posted  in  this  direction,  it  was  merely  to  give  warn 
ing  of  the  enemy's  approach.  But  these  were  the  days  of 
direct  assaults  and  not  of  turning  movements.  At  day 
break  on  the  morning  of  the  15th,  the  three  divisions  of 
infantry  under  Smith,  numbering  fully  fifteen  thousand 
men,  and  the  cavalry  of  Kautz,  twenty-five  hundred  strong, 
had  crossed  the  Appomattox  at  the  Point  of  Rocks  and 
were  on  the  march  to  capture  the  Cockade  City,  while 

1  Article  by  General  Colston  in  "Battles  and  Leaders  of  Civil  War," 
Vol.  IV. 


THE   POSTING  OF   WISE'S   TROOPS  347 

Lee  was  yet  on  the  north  side  of  the  James,  and  the  main 
body  of  Beauregard's  forces  were  confronting  Butler  on 
the  Bermuda  Hundred  line.  About  two  miles  east  of  the 
Petersburg  lines  were  stationed  Graham's  Battery  of  artil 
lery  and  the  cavalry  companies  under  Bearing.  These 
were  posted  behind  a  hastily  constructed  earthwork  in 
Baylor's  field  near  the  forks  of  the  Broadway  and  City 
Point  roads,  which,  according  to  General  Hinks  "com 
manded  the  (City  Point)  road,  as  it  debouched  from  the 
wood  and  swamp  near  Perkinson's  saw-mill."  Bearing 
had  dismounted  his  handful  of  cavalry  and  deployed  them 
as  infantrymen ;  and  upon  the  cavalry  of  Kautz  coming  in 
sight,  a  well-directed  fire  was  opened  against  the  latter, 
which  caused  them  to  fall  back.  Hinks,  who  was  in  the 
rear  of  Kautz,  pressed  forward  with  his  infantry  after  a 
reconnoissance  of  the  ground.  In  his  report  of  the  affair 
he  wrote :  "  The  wood  and  swamp,  through  which  was  a 
creek,  were  extremely  difficult  of  passage,  but  the  advance 
was  finally  made  by  most  of  the  regiment,  though  furiously 
assailed  with  spherical  case,  canister,  and  musketry  along 
the  whole  line.  Some  confusion,  however,  arose  among 
the  regiments  upon  the  left  of  the  road,  and  a  few  of  the 
men  fell  back  to  the  open  space  of  ground."  From  the 
edge  of  the  woods  to  the  works  was,  according  to  General 
Hinks,  about  four  hundred  yards  over  open,  rising  ground 
where  the  attack  was  made,  which  was  met  by  Bearing 
with  great  stubbornness. 

It  was  after  eight  A.M.  when  the  work  was  carried,  and 
this  delay  of  Smith's  columns  proved  to  be  of  incalculable 
advantage  to  Wise,  who  with  his  meagre  force  was  awaiting 
the  enemy's  advance.  About  ten  A.M.,  the  hot  skirmish 
fire  in  front  indicated  the  approach  of  Smith's  Corps,  and 
shortly  after,  his  three  divisions  arrived  in  front  of  the 
Confederate  works,  "covered  the  river,  Jordan's  Point 


348  THE   LIFE   OP   HENRY   A.  WISE 

and  City  Point  roads,  and  were  drawn  up  in  line  of  battle, 
with  Martindale  in  the  low  ground  on  the  right,  Brooks 
in  the  centre,  and  Hinks  on  the  left.  The  two  latter 
opposed  the  eastern  front  from  Battery  5  to  Battery  10; 
and  it  was  against  this  front  that  active  operations  were 
directed.  These  works  presented  a  very  formidable  aspect 
to  the  troops.  They  were  situated  on  commanding  crests, 
and  the  forest  was  felled  in  their  front,  so  as  to  expose 
advancing  lines  to  their  fire  for  half  a  mile,  or  more. 
Numerous  pieces  of  artillery  swept  the  field  of  fire  rapidly 
and  with  precision,  and  a  strong  line  of  skirmishers  in 
secure  rifle-pits,  well  advanced  in  front  of  the  works,  kept 
up  a  spirited  and  effective  fusillade.  These  circumstances 
necessarily  resulted  in  the  deploying  of  divisions  under 
cover  of  the  forest,  at  such  a  distance  from  the  works  that 
difficulty  was  encountered  in  making  connections,  as  the 
lines  converged  from  a  very  extended  arc ;  and  to  recon 
noitre  with  effect,  and  to  place  batteries  where  they  could 
aid  the  assaulting  parties,  required  that  the  lines  should 
be  advanced  to  exposed  eminences,  and  that  these  positions 
should  be  held  all  under  a  sharp  fire  —  which  was  a  work  of 
difficulty  and  delay." 1 

Wise  had  assumed  command  in  person  of  the  lines  from 
Batteries  14  to  23  inclusive,  while  his  right  toward  the 
Jerusalem  plank  road  was  intrusted  to  General  Colston. 
At  twelve  M.  Kautz  approached  the  Confederate  centre, 
apparently  with  the  object  of  threatening  the  Norfolk  and 
Petersburg  Railroad,  and  dismounting,  moved  up  as  in 
fantry  ;  while  about  the  same  time  Hinks  threw  forward 
a  brigade,  deployed  as  skirmishers  under  Colonel  Duncan 
in  front  of  Batteries  9  and  10.  Wise  had,  in  consequence, 
closed  his  line  from  the  right  to  support  the  Thirty-fourth 

1  Report  by  Colonel  T.  L.  Livemore  of  Hinks's  division,  belonging  to 
unpublished  manuscripts  of  Military  Historical  Society  of  Massachusetts. 


ATTACKS   ON  PETERSBURG  349 

Virginia,  under  Colonel  Goode,  and  stationed  Hood's  Bat 
talion  on  the  left  to  reenforce  Colonel  Page,  commanding  the 
Twenty-sixth  Regiment.  To  the  urgent  call  of  Wise  for  re- 
enforcements  from  the  north  side  of  the  Appomattox,  the 
reply  came  that  they  would  be  sent  and  to  hold  on  at  all 
hazards.  The  massing  of  the  enemy  along  the  crest  in  Jor 
dan's  field  necessitated  the  concentration  of  his  force  in  that 
direction  by  Wise,  where  they  were  hotly  engaged.  From 
Battery  No.  5  Captain  Nat  Sturdivant,  the  embodiment  of 
energy  and  bravery,  raked  the  field  with  his  artillery,  doing 
most  effective  work,  and  when  about  one  P.M.  Duncan's  Bri 
gade  advanced  in  front  of  the  Thirty-fourth  Regiment  and 
took  the  Confederate  rifle-pits,  the  regiment  charged  and 
drove  them  out.  "Again,"  wrote  Wise,  "the  enemy  re 
took  the  pits  and  were  again  driven  out ;  and  when  they 
advanced  the  third  time  upon  the  pits  the  whole  regiment 
leaped  the  parapets  and  gloriously  repulsed  them."  The 
deadly  fire  of  Wise's  artillery  had  delayed  Smith  in  com 
pleting  his  alignment  between  the  three  divisions  of  Mar- 
tindale,  Brooks,  and  Hinks,  who  were  posted  from  left  to 
right  in  the  order  named,  and  it  was  two  o'clock  before  the 
line  of  battle  was  formed.  Kautz,  who  continued  to  press 
on  the  Confederate  lines  in  the  direction  of  the  railroad, 
was  successfully  repulsed,  and  finally  withdrew  about 
5.30  P.M. 

Throughout  that  long,  hot  June  day  the  men  of  Wise's 
Brigade  fought  with  what  General  Beauregard  described  as 
"unsurpassed  stubbornness,"  resisting  the  advance  of  the 
enemy,  who  outnumbered  them  fully  seven  to  one.  A  part 
of  the  afternoon  was  spent  by  General  Smith  in  carefully 
reconnoitring  the  ground,  which  he  did  in  person  with 
great  care  and  intelligence.  The  Confederate  line  in  the 
quarter  of  Batteries  5,  6,  and  7  was  very  badly  located,  and 
General  Beauregard,  upon  first  inspecting  it,  is  said  to  have 


350  THE   LIFE  OF   HENKY   A.  WISE 

condemned  its  extension.  Here,  as  upon  other  occasions, 
the  troops  were  to  pay  the  penalty  of  occupying  a  salient. 
The  ground  in  front  of  these  redans  was  seamed  by  a  series 
of  gullies ;  and  a  deep  ravine  which  ran  between  Batteries 
6  and  7  had  been  discovered  by  Smith  while  making  his 
reconnoissance.  The  general  assault  which  he  had  planned 
to  take  place  about  five  P.M.  was  delayed  by  the  artillery 
horses  having  been  sent,  by  some  mistake,  to  the  rear  to 
be  watered,  and  it  was  after  seven  when  the  attack  was 
made.  The  plan  of  assault,  as  described  by  Colonel  Live- 
more,  was  the  German  method  of  throwing  forward  heavy 
lines  of  skirmishers,  in  lieu  of  lines  of  battle,  which  was, 
according  to  that  officer,  first  employed  on  an  extended 
scale  by  General  Smith.  Burnham's  skirmishers  plunged 
into  the  ravine  above  described,  between  Batteries  6  and  7, 
while  the  three  divisions  of  Hinks,  Brooks,  and  Martindale 
advanced  in  line  of  battle,  and  the  protection  afforded  by 
the  ravine  enabled  the  skirmishers  to  gain  the  rear  of  the 
Confederate  line  and  flank  Battery  5,  against  which  Brooks's 
division  was  hurled,  while  almost  simultaneously  Hinks's 
command  " rushed  forward,  as  the  movement  on  their  right 
was  seen  to  begin,  and  under  a  heavy  fire  carried  Battery  7 
with  loud  cheers." 

Though  assailed  in  front  and  on  the  flank,  which  last 
the  enemy  were  able  to  do  successfully,  through  the  cap 
ture  of  these  batteries  and  by  turning  the  guns  against  the 
other  redans,  Wise  continued  the  unequal  struggle  with 
singular  obstinacy;  but  the  enemy  succeeded  in  taking 
the  works  from  Batteries  3  to  11  inclusive.  The  cap 
ture  of  the  last  of  these,  however,  Battery  11  at  the  Dunn 
house,  was  not  effected  until  about  nine  o'clock  that 
night.  The  day  had  been  one  full  of  anxiety  for  Wise,  as 
he  rode  from  point  to  point,  along  the  lines,  giving  his 
orders  and  speaking  words  of  encouragement  to  his  men. 


ATTACKS   ON  PETERSBURG  351 

Upon  the  conduct  of  his  command  had  depended  the  fate 
of  Petersburg  and  Richmond,  and  the  confidence  reposed 
in  them  had  been  more  than  justified.  They  had  not 
only  made  a  glorious  struggle  against  overwhelming  odds, 
but  though  the  outer  line  had  been  partly  lost,  the  day 
had  been  saved ;  for  shortly  after  the  works  were  captured, 
the  Fifty-ninth  Regiment  of  Wise's  Brigade,  which  had 
been  on  the  north  side  of  the  Appomattox,  came  to  his 
assistance,  and  the  division  of  Hoke,  which  had  been  sent 
to  reenforce  Lee's  veterans  at  Cold  Harbor  and  had  rendered 
heroic  service  in  the  defence  of  Richmond,  arrived,  and 
Hagood's  Brigade,  which  was  in  the  advance,  was  hurried 
forward  on  the  City  Point  road  to  take  position  on  the 
left.  After  penetrating  the  works  between  Batteries  6 
and  7  the  enemy  had  succeeded  in  turning  the  right 
of  the  Twenty-sixth  and  the  left  of  the  Forty-sixth  Vir 
ginia  regiments,  and  the  former  suffered  considerable 
loss,  among  them  Lieutenant-Colonel  Council,  who  was 
captured,  while  Colonel  Randolph  Harrison  of  the  Forty- 
sixth  was  seriously  wounded. 

The  Confederates  fell  back  a  short  distance,  in  the  rear 
of  the  abandoned  works,  and,  during  the  night  of  the 
15th,  threw  up  a  small  epaulement  along  a  new  line,  ex 
tending  from  Battery  No.  2  "  through  Friends'  field  to  the 
woods,  and  thence  through  them  across  the  road  leading  to 
Dunn's  house,  and  thence  on  the  road  to  Webb's l  house." 
But  this  made  the  left  of  the  Confederate  line,  occupied 
by  Hagood,  in  echelon,  thrown  forward  on  the  left  and 
exposed  to  enfilading  fire,  and  at  daybreak  on  the  16th 
Hagood  withdrew  the  regiment  stationed  in  Batteries  1 
and  2  to  the  west  side  of  the  creek.  This  intermediate 

1  The  Webb  house  is  the  same  as  the  Shands  house,  and  is  situated 
about  three-quarters  of  a  mile  beyond  the  Dunn  house  in  the  direction  of 
the  Baxter  road. 


352  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

or  temporary  line  of  the  Confederates  ran  south  from  the 
Appomattox  along  the  ground  west  of  Harrison's  Creek, 
being  the  chord  of  the  arc  of  the  abandoned  works ;  and 
was  the  line  defended  during  the  16th  and  17th  of 
June,  after  which  time  the  permanent  line  was  occupied. 
Beauregard,  finding  it  impossible  to  longer  occupy  the 
Bermuda  Hundred  line  and  to  hold  Petersburg  at  the 
same  time,  ordered  the  evacuation  of  the  former,  during 
the  night  of  the  15th,  and  on  the  morning  of  the  16th  the 
force  defending  Petersburg  consisted  of  the  divisions  of 
Hoke  and  Johnson,  about  ten  thousand  effective  men,  of 
all  arms ;  the  former  being  stationed  on  the  left  toward 
the  Appomattox,  with  Johnson  on  the  right,  the  whole 
covering  a  distance  of  some  five  miles.  Wise,  with  his 
brigade,  was  posted  to  the  right  of  Clingman,  his  (Wise's) 
right  resting  on  the  apex  of  a  high  hill,  between  which 
and  Webb's  house  was  a  deep  ravine  and  a  gap  in  the  line 
a  quarter  of  a  mile  in  length.  Although  no  longer  in  com 
mand  in  the  field,  Wise  remained  (during  the  16th)  with 
his  brigade,  which  formed  a  part  of  the  heroic  force  who 
were  now  defending  Petersburg  not  only  against  Smith's 
Corps,  but  in  addition  that  of  Hancock,  who  had  arrived 
about  dusk  on  the  previous  day,  while  Burnside  came 
up  about  noon  on  the  16th,  and  Warren  at  nightfall 
on  the  same  day.  Prior  to  Warren's  arrival,  Hancock 
had  under  his  command  three  Federal  corps,  numbering 
upward  of  sixty  thousand  men,  to  assail  Beauregard's 
dauntless  veterans.  Much  censure  has  been  heaped  upon 
General  Smith  for  his  failure  to  take  Petersburg  on  the 
night  of  the  15th,  before  the  arrival  of  the  divisions  of 
Hoke  and  Johnson,  and  had  he  exhibited  the  daring 
energy  of  Wellington  at  Badajos,  he  could  have  un 
doubtedly  accomplished  that  task,  but  Smith  had  been 
misinformed  as  to  the  number  of  men  who  were  defending 


ATTACKS   ON   PETERSBURG  353 

the  lines  in  front  of  him,  and  the  perils  incident  to  an 
advance  after  nightfall  caused  him  to  determine  to  halt 
where  he  was,  and  await  the  arrival  of  Hancock's  Corps 
before  proceeding  further. 

Throughout  the  16th  Wise's  fagged  men  were  again 
called  upon  to  defend  the  Cockade  City  against  over 
whelming  odds,  and  gallantly  repulsed  the  assaults  made 
in  their  front  that  afternoon.  Wise  urged  General  John 
son  to  fill  the  gap  at  the  ravine  on  his  right,  which,  how- 
.ever,  was  neglected  with  sad  results.  Before  dawn  on  the 
17th  Potter's  Division  was  formed  in  this  ravine,  and  swept 
over  the  works  to  the  right  of  Wise,  occupied  by  John 
son's  Brigade,  capturing  a  number  of  prisoners  and  expos 
ing  Wise's  flank.  His  men,  however,  stood  firmly  and 
drove  the  enemy  back,  without  flinching.  In  this  attack, 
the  gallant  Colonel  Powhatan  R.  Page  of  the  Twenty- 
sixth  Regiment  was  killed,  and  Captain  George  D.  Wise, 
the  brigade  inspector,  received  a  wound  which  proved 
fatal.  Wise  remained  on  the  field  with  his  brigade 
until  noon  on  the  17th,  when  in  obedience  to  orders  he 
repaired  to  his  headquarters  in  the  city,  as  commander  of 
the  district.  The  command  of  his  brigade,  after  the  death 
of  Page,  devolved  upon  Colonel  J.  Thomas  Goode,  of  the 
Thirty-fourth  Regiment.  This  officer,  after  graduating  at 
the  Virginia  Military  Institute,  had  served  in  the  United 
States  army  prior  to  the  war,  but  upon  the  secession  of 
Virginia  tendered  his  services  to  his  native  State.  During 
the  17th  the  brigade  again  rendered  effective  service,  in 
repulsing  the  attack  of  Wilcox,  maintaining  their  place 
with  great  gallantry ;  but  late  in  the  afternoon  Ledlie's 
Division  carried  a  portion  of  the  intrenchments  on  their 
right,  and  turned  the  right  of  Wise's  Brigade,  consisting  of 
the  Forty -sixth  Virginia  Regiment,  and  compelled  it  to  fall 
back  about  one  hundred  yards  to  the  edge  of  a  wood  in 

2A 


354  THE  LIFE  OF  HENRY  A.  WISE 

their  rear,  where,  however,  it  soon  rallied  and  quickly 
charged  the  works,  carrying  them  as  far  as  the  left  centre 
of  the  regiment,  and  were  still  advancing,  when  Major 
J.  C.  Hill,  who  had  leaped  upon  a  traverse,  fell  wounded, 
and  the  hot  fire  of  the  enemy  caused  the  regiment  to  fall 
back  a  second  time.  The  flagstaff  had  been  shot  in  two 
pieces,  and  the  colors  perforated  by  eighteen  bullet-holes, 
while  the  flag-bearer  Rogers  was  dangerously  wounded. 
The  men  were  rallied  a  second  time  by  Captain  John  H. 
White,  and  Gracie's  Alabama  Brigade  coming  to  the  rescue 
the  enemy  were  driven  back  with  great  loss.  The  Thirty- 
fourth  Virginia  Regiment  of  Wise's  Brigade  had  maintained 
their  place  in  the  line  and  served  as  a  pivot,  on  which  the 
Forty-sixth  was  rallied.  Their  loss,  however,  had  been 
severe,  and  of  the  twelve  field-officers  of  the  brigade  nine 
had  been  either  killed,  wounded,  or  captured  during  the 
attacks  on  Petersburg. 

On  the  night  of  the  17th  Beauregard  fell  back  to  a  line 
marked  off  in  the  rear  of  Taylor's  Creek,  which  was  the 
one  occupied  from  that  date  to  the  commencement  of  the 
retreat  to  Appomattox  Court-House. 

It  would  be  difficult  to  exaggerate  the  heroic  resistance 
of  Beauregard's  men  during  these  first  days  at  Petersburg, 
while  the  Army  of  Northern  Virginia  was  on  the  north 
side  of  the  James ;  and  on  the  9th  and  15th  of  June  the 
defence  of  the  city  had  devolved  upon  Wise,  to  whom  the 
credit  of  having  twice  saved  the  gateway  to  Richmond  is 
justly  due.  Nor  should  the  stubborn  valor,  as  well  as  the 
numbers  of  the  attacking  forces,  be  overlooked.  It  has  of 
late  been  the  custom  of  certain  Northern  writers  to  dis 
parage  the  temper  of  Grant's  army  at  this  time,  and  to 
describe  it  as  lacking  in  spirit  and  without  the  fierce  im 
petuosity  that  characterized  it  at  the  commencement  of 
the  Wilderness  Campaign.  It  is  probably  true  that  the 


ATTACKS   ON  PETERSBURG  355 

long  series  of  direct  assaults  from  the  Rapidan  to  Cold 
Harbor  had  taught  the  men  the  danger  to  be  apprehended 
from  this  character  of  attack  and  that  it  had  lessened 
in  some  degree  their  recklessness,  if  not  their  confidence 
in  their  commanding  officers;  but  the  number  of  fierce 
assaults  on  the  Petersburg  lines  during  the  15th,  16th, 
17th,  and  18th  of  June,  1864,  and  the  list  of  the  killed  and 
wounded  among  the  Union  troops,  justifies  the  conclusion 
of  Mr.  Ropes,  that  the  failure  to  take  Petersburg  was  due 
to  the  officers  and  not  to  the  men.  Of  the  Federal  sol 
dier  at  this  time  it  may  be  said  that  he  "  dared  do  all  that 
might  become  a  man,"  and  had  he  been  under  the  com 
mand  of  a  general  with  a  clear  idea  of  the  nature  of  the 
duty  to  be  performed,  and  the  numerous  assaults  of  these 
early  days  been  conducted  with  concert  of  action  on  the 
part  of  the  various  division  commanders,  Petersburg  would 
have  fallen,  and  the  war  ended  shortly  thereafter.  But  no 
criticism  of  these  early  movements  can  detract  from  the 
valor  of  the  troops  engaged.  Of  the  conduct  of  his  men 
at  this  time  General  Beauregard  has  written :  "  No  event 
of  our  war  was  more  remarkable  than  the  almost  incredi 
ble  resistance  of  the  handful  of  men  who  served  under  me 
at  Petersburg,  on  the  15th,  16th,  17th,  and  18th  of  June, 
before  the  arrival  of  General  Lee.  They  knew  they  were 
fighting  more  than  seven  times  their  number.  In  fact,  the 
disproportion  of  the  first  day  had  been  much  greater ;  and 
opposed  to  them  were  some  of  the  finest  and  best  disci 
plined  Federal  corps.  They  (my  troops)  had  had  no 
regular  sleep,  and  had  hardly  had  a  scant  meal  once  in 
twenty-four  hours.  And  yet  the  courage,  the  endurance 
and  spirit  of  these  men  never  quailed.  They  fought  unre 
mittingly  until  the  end  —  until  their  opponents  ceased  to 
fight.  Not  one  of  them  had  left  his  post,  except,  per 
haps,  to  remove  the  dead  body  of  a  fallen  comrade,  or  to 


356  THE  LIFE   OF   HENKY   A.  WISE 

have  bandaged  his  own  wound.  I  am  proud  to  think  that 
I  was  the  leader  of  such  troops.  My  own  regret  is  that 
the  name  of  each  of  them  is  not  inscribed  on  the  memorial 
tablets  of  history." l 

1  North  American  Review,  Vol.  CXLV.  page  515,  "  The  Battle  of  Peters 
burg,"  by  General  Beauregard. 


CHAPTER  XX 

THE  BATTLE  OF  THE  CRATER.  GRANT'S  ATTACKS  ON  LEE'S 
RIGHT  IN  MARCH,  1865.  THE  RETREAT  TO  APPOMATTOX. 
SAILOR'S  CREEK.  SURRENDER  OF  LEE'S  ARMY.  WISE 

PAROLED 

THE  life  of  the  trenches  had  now  begun  for  the  troops 
before  Petersburg,  and  the  pick  and  shovel  were  substi 
tuted  for  the  bayonet,  until  the  affair  of  the  Crater 
on  July  30,  1864.  Meanwhile  Wise's  Brigade  had  re 
mained  under  the  command  of  Colonel  Goode,  the  former 
having  established  his  headquarters,  as  the  commander  of 
the  district,  at  the  Dunlop  House  in  Petersburg.  At  the 
time  of  the  mine  explosion,  early  in  the  morning  of  the 
30th,  the  brigade  occupied  the  eminence  south  of  the  Bax 
ter  road,  about  one  hundred  yards  from  the  scene  of  the 
explosion,  and  as  the  enemy's  masses  moved  on  the  open 
ground  up  to  the  breach,  the  former  poured  in  a  deadly 
fire  upon  them.  Colonel  Goode,  according  to  the  report 
of  General  Bushrod  Johnson,  caused  the  Fifty-ninth  Regi 
ment  to  be  formed  in  a  ditch  running  at  right  angles  to 
the  main  work,  uand  when  the  enemy  attempted  some 
five  times  to  form  in  rear  of  the  breach  for  the  purpose 
of  charging  to  the  right,  and  after  they  had  planted 
four  colors  on  the  line,  by  which  the  movement  desig 
nated  was  to  be  made,  the  Regiment  under  Captain  Wood, 
and  the  Twenty-sixth  Virginia  Regiment  under  Captain 
Steele,  with  the  Twenty-second  and  the  Twenty-third 

357 


358  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

South  Carolina  regiments,  and  two  guns  of  battery  near 
the  junctions  of  the  Baxter  and  Jerusalem  plank  roads, 
opened  with  a  fire  that  drove  them  precipitately  back  to 
the  Crater.  In  this  way  the  conflict  was  maintained  from 
five  till  nearly  ten  A.M.  with  coolness  and  steadiness  by 
determined  men  and  officers  on  both  flanks  of  the  breach, 
and  with  a  success  worthy  of  much  praise  and  with  great 
damage  to  the  enemy."  At  about  ten  A.M.  the  brigade 
of  Mahone,  which  had  been  brought  some  two  and  a  half 
miles  from  the  right,  arrived,  and  made  the  gallant  charge 
by  which  the  Confederate  line  was  reestablished. 

In  the  month  of  November,  1864,  Wise  rejoined  his 
brigade,  and  during  the  winter  of  1864-65  shared  with 
his  men  the  discomforts  and  hardships  of  the  trenches. 

"Early  in  March,  1865,1  we  were  ordered  to  Lee's 
extreme  right  at  Hatcher's  Run.  Then  commenced  the 
preliminaries  of  the  retreat,  strong  guards  near  Burgess's 
Mill,  where  the  plank  road  crossed  our  line.  On  the  28th 
of  March  the  firing  became  hot  and  heavy;  we  felt  that 
something  had  given  way  on  our  left.  Sheridan's  mounted 
infantry  (miscalled  cavalry)  was  bearing  on  Five  Forks, 
and  General  Pickett  was  advanced  to  that  point  at  the 
head  of  Gravelly  Run  fork,  on  the  White  Oak  road ;  and 
General  Meade's  corps  of  twenty-five  thousand  men  was 
advancing  in  our  front  across  Arthur's  Creek.  Ransom's 
and  Hunton's  brigades  were  taken  from  our  division  to 
reenforce  Pickett  at  Five  Forks,  and  Evan's  old  brigade 
of  South  Carolina,  then  commanded  by  General  W.  H. 
Wallace,  and  our  brigade,  were  left  alone  at  Hatcher's 
Run.  On  the  29th  of  March  our  brigade  was  ordered 
into  line  of  battle  at  the  point  near  Burgess's  Mill  where 
what  is  called  the  Military  road  forks  with  the  plank 

1  Address  delivered  by  Wise  in  Gloucester  County,  Virginia,  in  1870, 
on  the  Career  of  Wise's  Brigade. 


GRANT'S  ATTACK  ON  LEE'S  RIGHT  359 

road  to  Dinwiddie  Court-House,  and  General  Wise  was  or 
dered  to  advance  quickly  4  on  the  Military  road,  to  Grav 
elly  Run,  guiding  by  the  centre,  and  to  fight  everything  in 
our  way.'  We  threw  the  Thirty-fourth  and  Forty -sixth 
on  the  right  of  the  road,  and  the  Twenty-sixth  and  Fifty- 
ninth  on  the  left.  Within  six  hundred  yards  from  the 
place  where  the  brigade  was  ordered  forward,  we  struck 
the  enemy  obliquely,  diverging  from  left  to  right.  They 
were  in  four  lines,  which  we  charged  and  broke,  and  drove 
the  first  upon  the  second  and  the  second  upon  the  third, 
until  the  four  lines  were  massed  in  our  front,  in  a  dense 
growth  of  pine  thicket  on  the  right  and  a  heavy  growth 
of  oak,  with  an  undergrowth  of  Black  Jack,  on  the  left 
of  the  road,  at  the  distance  of  ten  to  twenty  paces  on  the 
left  and  thirty  on  the  right.  But  the  line  of  the  enemy 
being  so  much  longer  than  our  own,  the  angle  at  which 
we  struck  them  gave  them  an  enfilade  fire  on  our  left ; 
nevertheless,  under  the  order  to  lie  flat  and  shoot  from 
a  rest  on  the  elbows,  we  maintained .  the  dreadful  conflict 
for  one  hour  and  a  half,  when  the  Fifty-ninth  and  Twenty- 
sixth  were  obliged  to  break;  but  they  soon  rallied  on 
General  Wallace  in  reserve  at  the  Forks,  came  up  again 
with  his  brigade  to  the  aid  of  the  Forty-sixth  and  Thirty- 
fourth,  until  Wallace  and  the  Twenty-sixth,  Fifty-ninth, 
and  Forty-sixth  were  again  broken  and  gave  way,  leaving 
the  Thirty-Fourth  alone  under  fire,  where  it  stood  and 
fought  to  within  thirty  paces  of  the  enemy's  artillery, 
until  thrice  ordered  to  retreat.  We  fell  back  again  to 
the  parapet  at  Hatcher's  Run,  rested  the  30th  there, 
and  on  the  31st  again  were  ordered  to  fall  in  on  the  left 
of  McGowan's  Brigade  and  charge  the  enemy.  The  Fifty- 
ninth  were  left  to  guard  the  trenches,  and  the  Twenty- 
sixth,  Thirty-fourth,  and  Forty-sixth  went  into  the 
charge.  They,  with  McGowan's  Brigade,  did  good  execu- 


360  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY  A.  WISE 

tion  in  staggering  the  overpowering  columns  of  Meade, 
and  in  delaying  their  advance  to  Five  Forks.  In  these 
two  fights  a  number  of  the  best  and  bravest  fell  among 
the  killed  and  wounded,  among  whom  were  Lieutenant- 
Colonel  Harrison,  of  the  Thirty-fourth;  Captain  Barks- 
dale,  of  the  Fifty-ninth;  and  Lieutenant  Barksdale 
Warwick,  of  my  staff,  who  died  with  a  smile  of  the  gaudia 
certaminis  on  his  face,  struck  whilst  waving  his  sword 
and  shouting  4  Charge !  Charge  ! ' 

"  On  the  night  of  the  1st  of  April,  we  fell  back  across 
Hatcher's  Run  to  Sutherland's  on  the  South-side  Railroad 
and  pressed  forward  after  Hunton,  to  reenforce  Pickett  at 
Five  Forks.  On  Sabbath  morning,  the  2d  of  April,  we 
reached  Church  Crossings,  and  were  kneeling  to  God, 
under  the  prayers  of  Chaplain  W.  E.  Wiatt  of  the  Twenty- 
sixth,  when  an  order  announced  the  defeat  of  Pickett  at 
Five  Forks  and  that  we  must  fall  back  to  the  Appomattox. 
On  Sunday  at  noon  we  reached  the  Namozine  Creek,  and 
lodged  our  right  on  its  banks.  The  enemy  came  up  imme 
diately,  whilst  we  were  throwing  up  breastworks,  and  Sher 
idan's  cavalry  sounded  the  bugle-notes  of  charge  until 
nightfall,  from  a  heavy  wood  in  our  front.  This  was  but 
a  feint  to  deceive  Fitz  Lee's  dismounted  cavalry  on  our 
left.  At  dark  the  enemy  pressed  decidedly  upon  him, 
when  he  called  for  reinforcements  from  the  infantry.  We 
ordered  the  Fifty-ninth  down  the  breastworks  immediately, 
leaped  them  before  reaching  the  cavalry,  formed  at  right 
angles  to  the  breastworks  on  the  enemy's  left,  and  scat 
tered  them  at  the  first  volley.  That  night  we  crossed  the 
Namozine,  and  the  next  day,  the  3d  of  April,  crossed  the 
Winticomack  Creek,  and  as  we  reached  the  defile  of  Deep 
Creek  near  Mannsboro,  Sheridan's  cavalry,  in  position  at 
the  defile,  opened  a  galling  fire  upon  our  advanced  guard. 
The  Fifty-ninth  had  been  ordered  to  assist  in  bringing  up 


GRANT'S  ATTACK  ON  LEE'S  RIGHT  361 

the  rear,  and  thus  we  consisted  then  of  the  Twenty-sixth 
under  the  younger  Perrin,  the  elder  having  been  badly 
shattered  to  pieces  at  the  charge  of  Hewlett's  the  year 
before ;  the  Forty-sixth  under  Captain  Abbott,  Colonels 
Harrison  and  Wise  being  both  wounded  and  exempted, 
and  the  Thirty-fourth  under  Colonel  J.  Thomas  Goode. 
Immediately  upon  the  fire  we  turned  the  head  of  our 
column  obliquely  to  the  right  through  an  open  field  to  a 
curtilage  of  houses,  where  the  Twenty-sixth  and  Forty- 
sixth  were  posted,  and  the  Thirty-fourth  was  deployed 
to  the  open  ground  on  our  right,  to  decoy  a  charge  upon 
it  passing  the  front  of  the  other  two  regiments  behind  the 
houses.  The  decoy  succeeded.  The  enemy  had  dis 
mounted,  tied  their  horses  on  the  other  side  of  the  creek 
some  six  hundred  yards  off,  and  charged  on  foot  obliquely 
by  the  houses,  upon  the  Thirty-fourth,  until  they  came 
close  in  front  of  the  Twenty-sixth  and  Forty-sixth,  which 
burst  upon  their  right  flank  so  sudden  and  so  sharp  that 
they  broke  and  fled,  and  were  so  pressed  by  the  three  regi 
ments  that  they  could  not  reach  their  horses  and  mount  in 
time  to  prevent  a  severe  loss  of  men  and  horses.  Here  we 
were  halted  for  the  entire  line  to  pass,  with  orders  to  bring 
up  the  rear.  Thence  we  passed  on  by  Amelia  Court-House, 
Jetersville,  and  Deatonsville,  zigzagging  from  right  to  left 
and  from  left  to  right,  and  skirmishing  the  whole  way 
until  we  came  to  the  forks  of  Sailor's  Creek,  near  James 
town,  and  the  High  Bridge,  on  the  6th  of  April.  What 
was  left  of  our  division,  Wise's  Brigade  of  Virginia,  and 
Wallace's  of  South  Carolina,  were  posted  on  the  left  of 
Pickett's  Division,  then  reduced  to  an  inconsiderable  num 
ber  by  the  stampede  at  Five  Forks.  Corse's  Brigade  and 
Ransom's  had  stood  their  ground  there  well,  and  suffered 
very  much.  Whilst  in  position  at  the  forks  of  the  road 
when  the  baggage  train  passed  to  the  right  and  the  artillery 


362  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY  A.  WISE 

to  the  left,  we  were  ordered  to  detail  two  regiments  to 
guard  the  left  of  Wallace's  Brigade  ;  the  Twenty-sixth  and 
Fifty-ninth  were  detailed,  and  when  the  order  came,  as  it 
did,  to  join  Pickett  on  his  left  and  attack  the  enemy,  we 
had  but  two  regiments,  the  Forty-sixth  and  Thirty-fourth, 
to  go  into  the  fight  with.  We  came  in  half-rifle  range  of 
the  enemy  near  the  east  fork  of  Sailor's  Creek  on  our  left ; 
Wallace's  Brigade  came  up  between  our  two  regiments  and 
the  east  fork,  when  we  found  that  the  enemy  were  coming 
up  on  our  left,  and  we  were  annoyed  by  an  enfilading  fire. 
In  our  front  was  a  curtilage  of  houses,  dwelling,  kitchen, 
barns,  stables,  and  tobacco-houses,  reaching  a  half-mile,  and 
with  a  large  graveyard  enclosed  by  a  rough  stone  wall,  all 
filled  by  the  enemy,  who  were  pouring  in  a  fire  so  galling 
that  we  were  compelled  to  lie  down  in  the  copse  of  pine 
where  we  were  posted.  The  enemy  had  broken  the  forces 
under  General  Ewell,  and  were  then  pouring  down  upon 
our  left.  Under  these  circumstances,  we  detailed  two 
companies  from  the  Thirty-fourth,  under  Captain  William 
Jordan,  of  Bedford  County,  to  drive  off  the  sharpshooters 
who  were  enfilading  our  left,  which  duty  he  did  with 
signal  efficiency,  and  Colonels  Abner  Perrin  and  Tabb 
coming  up  at  the  time  to  the  left  of  Wallace,  they  were 
ordered  to  support  Jordan  with  the  Twenty-sixth  and 
Fifty-ninth  regiments  and  to  push  the  enemy  until  they 
came  opposite  their  right  flank  in  our  front.  The  moment 
they  did  so  we  charged  in  front  upon  the  stone  wall  and 
houses,  and  Perrin  and  Tabb  and  Jordan  charged  upon 
the  enemy's  right  flank,  and  we  broke  them  thoroughly, 
and  drove  them  some  one  and  a  half  to  two  miles,  un 
assisted  by  either  the  forces  of  Wallace  or  Pickett,  when 
Colonel  (R.  P.)  Duncan,  of  General  Anderson's  staff, 
ordered  us  to  fall  back  to  Pickett's  rear  to  form  at  right 
angles  to  his  line  and  to  retreat  to  the  road  of  our  march. 


BATTLE   OF   SAILOR'S   CREEK  363 

"  We  had  already  formed  and  begun  to  move  in  his  rear 
before  Pickett's  whole  command  stampeded,  leaving  our 
artillery  in  the  enemy's  hands,  and  they  were  exploding 
our  caissons  in  a  lane  in  our  front.  We  pressed  forward 
across  a  branch  of  the  west  fork  of  Sailor's  Creek,  and 
were  surrounded  by  the  enemy  entirely  on  our  rear  and 
left  and  halfway  down  our  front.  Wallace's  Brigade  broke 
and  fled  to  a  woods  on  our  right.  We  pressed  up  a  hill 
in  our  front,  halted  behind  a  worm-fence  on  the  crest, 
fired  three  volleys  to  the  rear,  and  retreating  again,  moved 
quickly  down  the  hill,  putting  it  between  us  and  the 
enemy  in  our  rear,  and  poured  three  volleys  obliquely  to 
the  left  and  front,  broke  the  enemy  and  got  out.  Here 
the  Twenty-sixth  showed  its  exemplary  drill.  Perrin 
gallantly  rallied  his  regiment,  and  upon  its  nucleus  we 
formed  and  seized  the  whole  brigade  in  sight  of  the 
broken  enemy.  After  rallying  and  forming,  we  poured 
three  volleys  into  the  woods  where  Wallace's  Brigade  were 
ensconced,  and  it  raised  a  white  flag  and  came  out  to  us 
and  formed  and  marched  with  us  safely  off  the  field,  and 
gained  our  road  past  the  enemy.  Anderson,  Pickett,  and 
(B.  R.)  Johnson  had  left  the  field  before  we  cut  through 
and  gone  on  to  the  High  Bridge  and  Farmville.  At  one 
o'clock  at  night  we  reached  the  High  Bridge  and  found  it 
shut  down.  After  getting  over  it  we  marched  a  mile  or 
more  on  toward  Farmville,  and  bivouacked  until  the 
morning  of  the  7th.  We  were  overcome  by  exhaustion, 
and  without  food  or  refreshment  of  any  kind.  There  was 
no  water  but  the  pools,  as  red  as  brick-dust,  in  the  soil  of 
that  region.  Colonel  J.  Thomas  Goode,  Captain  Jordan, 
and  myself  washed  or  cooled  our  faces  and  hands  in  the 
same  pool  the  next  morning,  and  neither  of  us  had  a  hand 
kerchief  or  towel  to  wipe  with,  and  consequently  the  paint 
of  the  red  water  remained  on  our  faces  and  at  the  edges  of 


364  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

our  hair;  and  during  the  night  a  soldier  of  the  Thirty- 
fourth  found  me  sleeping  without  a  blanket  or  coat  on  the 
chilling  earth  —  the  enemy  had  captured  my  orderly  and 
body-servant,  with  my  cloak  and  two  of  my  horses  —  a 
wounded  man  at  Sailor's  Creek  had  escaped  on  my  riding- 
horse  proper,  and  the  noble  private,  whom  I  don't  know, 
wrapped  me,  more  dead  than  alive,  in  his  coarse  gray 
blanket,  pinning  it  on  with  a  wire  pin,  both  of  which  I 
have  now,  and  the  gold  of  Ophir  could  not  buy  them. 
With  a  face  painted  like  an  Indian,  with  the  gray  blanket 
around  me,  and  with  the  Confederate  Tyrolese  hat  on  — 
not  off,  as  ridiculously  stated  —  and  muddy  all  over,  I  put 
myself  on  foot  at  the  head  of  the  two  brigades  and  marched 
on  the  railroad  to  near  Farmville.  There  an  officer  of 
General  Lee  met  me  and  ordered  us  to  move  to  him,  then 
in  sight  on  his  gray.  Turning  the  head  of  the  column  to 
the  right,  down  the  railroad  embankment,  we  marched 
across  the  open  field  to  where  he  was  sitting  in  his  saddle, 
with  General  B.  R.  Johnson  on  his  horse  a  little  in  the 
rear.  The  latter  had  fled  from  Sailor's  Creek  and  reported 
me  killed  and  the  whole  division  cut  to  pieces  and  dis 
persed.  As  I  moved  up  with  the  two  brigades  I  saw  that 
General  Lee  was  suppressing  a  laugh.  I  knew  he  had  a 
sub-vein  of  humor,  which  he  was  hardly  concealing  when 
he  saw  my  appearance  —  that  of  a  Comanche  savage.  He 
was  right ;  I  was  savage  and  looked  like  an  Indian,  and 
waited  not  to  be  accosted,  when  I  exclaimed  with  an  oath : 
4  General  Lee,  these  men  shall  not  move  another  inch 
unless  they  have  something  more  to  eat  than  parched  corn 
taken  from  starving  mules.'  He  smiled  with  great  bland- 
ness,  and  said :  — 

"  '  They  deserve  something  to  eat,  sir.  Let  them,  with 
out  taking  down  the  fence,  move  to  the  trees  on  yonder 
hill,  and  they  shall  be  filled  for  once  at  least.  And  you, 


SURRENDER   OF   LEE'S   ARMY  365 

General  Wise,  will  pause  here  a  moment  with  me/ 
When  the  brigades  passed  on,  he  turned  to  me  and  said, 
4  You,  sir,  will  take  command  of  all  these  forces.'  There 
were  no  organized  forces,  but  the  two  brigades  I  came 
up  with,  in  sight;  there  were  thousands  of  disorganized 
troops  in  all  directions  without  order  or  command.  I 
protested  that  I  could  not  take  such  a  command.  I  had 
no  horses.  He  ordered  me  to  get  a  horse,  and  make  all 
the  stragglers  and  disorganized  men  fall  into  my  ranks. 

"...  And  I  first  went  to  breakfast,  and  then  to  the  work 
which  wound  up  at  Appomattox  on  the  9th,  when  and 
where  I  signed  the  paroles  of  more  than  5000  men  besides 
those  of  my  own  brigade.  .  .  .  Alas!  how  few  were  there  at 
last  of  those  who  were  comrades  with  us  at  first.  There 
were  less  than  1000  left  of  the  2850  returned  from 
Charleston  in  May,  1864.  Less  than  half  were  paroled  of 
2400  who  charged  at  Hewlett's.  Their  last,  after  fighting 
in  nineteen  battles,  was  their  most  glorious  charge ;  and 
they  fired  the  last  guns  of  the  infantry  at  Appomattox." 

Of  Wise's  part  in  the  retreat  to  Appomattox,  Major- 
General  Fitzhugh  Lee  wrote  in  his  final  report:  "The 
notice  of  the  commanding  general  is  also  directed  to 
Brigadier-Generals  Henry  A.  Wise  and  Eppa  Hunton, 
commanding  infantry  brigades,  and  who  were  more  or 
less  under  my  command  until  Amelia  Court-House  was 
reached.  The  disheartening  surrounding  influences  had 
no  effect  upon  them  ;  they  kept  their  duty  plainly  in  view, 
and  they  fully  performed  it.  The  past  services  of  Gen 
eral  Henry  A.  Wise,  his  antecedents  in  civil  life,  and  his 
age,  caused  his  bearing  upon  this  most  trying  retreat  to 
shine  conspicuously  forth.  His  unconquerable  spirit  was 
filled  with  as  much  earnestness  and  zeal  in  April,  1865,  as 
when  he  first  took  up  arms  four  years  ago,  and  the  freedom 
with  which  he  exposed  a  long  life  laden  with  honors 


366  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY  A.  WISE 

proved  he  was  willing  to  sacrifice  it,  if  it  would  conduce 
toward  attaining  the  liberty  of  his  country." 

On  the  day  following  the  battle  of  Sailor's  Creek  Gen 
eral  Robert  E.  Lee  had  promoted  Wise  to  the  rank  of 
major-general ;  and  when  a  day  or  two  later  it  was  found 
that  the  Army  of  Northern  Virginia  would  have  to  be 
surrendered,  the  former,  in  conversation  with  Wise,  told 
him  that  as  he  was  particularly  obnoxious  to  the  Federal 
authorities,  he  was  at  liberty  to  look  out  for  himself,  if  he 
so  desired.  This  the  latter  declined  to  do,  replying  that 
he  would  share  the  fate  of  his  men ;  and  he,  furthermore, 
agreed  with  General  Lee  that  it  was  their  duty  to  remain 
in  Virginia,  and  aid  in  the  restoration  of  civil  government 
among  her  people. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

SCENES  AT  THE  SURRENDER.  GENERALS  MEADE  AND  CUSTER. 
WISE  VISITS  HIS  SON  AND  FRIENDS  IN  SOUTH-SIDE  VIRGINIA. 
HIS  HORSE,  PAIR  OF  MULES,  AND  AN  AMBULANCE  SEIZED. 
FINDS  HIS  HOME  IN  POSSESSION  OF  THE  FREEDMANJS  BUREAU. 
OIL  PAINTINGS  AND  FURNITURE  STOLEN.  ANECDOTE  OF 
GENERAL  BUTLER.  CORRESPONDENCE  WITH  GENERAL  LEE  IN 
REGARD  TO  PROCLAMATION  OF  AMNESTY.  INDICTED  FOR 
TREASON.  LOCATES  IN  RICHMOND,  AND  RESUMES  PRACTICE 
OF  LAW.  CORRESPONDENCE  WITH  HIS  DAUGHTER,  AND  THE 
HON.  FERNANDO  WOOD.  VIEWS  OF  THE  POLITICAL  CONDI 
TIONS  IN  VIRGINIA.  ADVICE  TO  THE  YOUNG  MEN  OF  THE 
STATE 

GENERAL  MEADE,  commanding  the  Army  of  the  Poto 
mac,  and  General  Wise  were  brothers-in-law,  the  former 
having  married  Margaretta  Sergeant,  eldest  daughter  of 
the  Hon.  John  Sergeant,  of  Philadelphia,  and  sister  of  the 
second  Mrs.  Wise.  The  relations  existing  between  the 
two  families  had  been  of  the  closest  sort,  particularly  those 
between  Generals  Meade  and  Wise. 

The  former  had  at  one  time  resigned  from  the  army, 
and  procured  through  the  influence  of  the  latter  a  more 
lucrative  position  in  the  United  States  Coast  Survey  ser 
vice.  Afterward,  through  Wise's  good  offices,  Meade  was 
transferred  to  the  Engineer  Corps  of  the  army,  and  assigned 
to  duty  at  Detroit,  where  he  lived  when  the  war  came  on. 

For  the  first  time  in  eight  years  the  two  met  at  Appo- 

367 


368  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

mattox,  and  their  meeting  was  most  touching  and  affec 
tionate.  By  his  tenderness  and  solicitude  for  Wise,  Meade 
disarmed  every  feeling  of  estrangement,  and  after  calling 
in  person  and  greeting  General  Wise  with  all  the  warmth 
of  old  friendship,  and  observing  that  he  was  dismounted, 
he  sent  his  young  son,  Colonel  George  Meade,  with  an 
ambulance  and  pair  of  mules,  laden  with  every  necessary 
and  luxury,  with  instructions  to  place  the  outfit  at  the  dis 
posal  of  General  Wise  to  convey  him  to  his  home,  and  to 
be  turned  over  to  the  nearest  government  officer  when 
General  Wise  had  no  further  use  for  them.  When  Gen 
eral  Meade  returned  to  Richmond,  his  first  care  was  to 
visit  the  female  members  of  General  Wise's  family,  and 
tender  them  all  that  love  and  courtesy  could  suggest. 
Writing  to  Wise  in  June,  1867,  introducing  Mr.  Ropes, 
the  historian,  General  Meade  said :  — 

"I  reciprocate  all  your  kind  feeling.  The  war  never 
changed  my  good  feeling  for  you,  and  never  in  the  small 
est  degree  diminished  the  gratitude  I  have  always  felt  to 
you  for  the  many  acts  of  kindness  received  at  your  hands 
when  you  had  the  power  to  do  me  service,  and  when  I 
attacked  Petersburg  on  the  16th  and  17th  of  June,  1864, 
when  we  ought  to  have  whipped  you,  and  I  learned  from 
prisoners  that  you  were  in  command,  painful  and  embar 
rassing  as  was  the  knowledge,  yet  it  did  not  for  an  instant 
stay  my  determination  to  drive  you  across  the  Appomattox 
if  I  could,  and  I  am  only  sorry  for  my  sake,  as  well  as 
yours,  that  I  did  not  succeed,  for  it  might  have  brought 
an  earlier  termination  of  the  horrid  war  and  the  terrible 
slaughter  then  prevailing. 

"  So,  also,  at  Gettysburg  I  think  it  must  be  evident  to 
intelligent  men  on  both  sides  that  it  was  a  great  mis 
fortune  that  I  could  not  have  accomplished  a  more  deci 
sive  result,  because  with  such  a  result  peace  might  have 


GENERALS   MEADE   AND   CUSTER  369 

been  brought  about  two  years  earlier  than  it  was.  By  the 
by,  has  your  conscience  never  disturbed  you  for  your 
agency  at  Gettysburg  ?  for  you  know  if  it  had  not  been 
for  your  kindness  in  having  me  reappointed  to  the  army, 
I  should  not  have  been  in  command  on  that  field  so  fatal 
to  your  cause. 

"  Do  believe  me  when  I  say  old  times  are  present  times 
with  me  so  far  as  you  and  yours  are  concerned,  however 
much  we  may  differ  as  to  what  has  occurred  or  is  occur- 
ring." 

The  cordial  feelings  manifested  in  this  letter  continued 
between  the  two  until  the  death  of  General  Meade,  which 
occurred  shortly  before  that  of  General  Wise. 

General  Wise  had  a  quick  sense  of  humor,  and  told  a 
story  well.  An  episode  which  occurred  at  the  surrender 
at  Appomattox  was  frequently  repeated  by  him  with  keen 
relish.  His  brigade  was  actually  engaged  for  some  time 
after  the  order  for  the  cessation  of  hostilities  was  pro 
mulgated.  In  fact,  he  lost  several  valuable  officers  in 
the  interim  between  the  issuance  of  General  Lee's  order 
to  cease  firing  and  the  time  it  reached  the  lines.  He 
delighted  to  tell  that  when  the  orders  came  his  men  "  did 
not  know  they  were  whipped,  and  had  the  Yankees  on  the 
run."  On  receiving  the  orders,  firing  ceased,  the  men 
stacked  arms,  and  he,  learning  what  was  going  forward, 
walked  a  short  distance  down  the  road  alone.  He  was 
dressed  in  an  old  overcoat  with  a  large  cape,  and  wore  a 
slouch  hat.  As  was  his  custom  when  under  excitement, 
he  was  chewing  tobacco  vigorously.  Just  as  he  was  re 
turning  to  his  command,  a  dashing  young  Union  cavalry 
officer,  magnificently  mounted,  came  down  the  road  at  a 
hard  gallop,  his  yellow  hair  floating  in  the  breeze,  and  his 
whole  manner  betraying  excitement,  as  he  called  out  to 
General  Wise,  "  Surrender !  surrender !  "  Wise,  without 

2s 


370  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

as  much  as  "  shifting  his  quid,"  continued  his  walk  until 
the  officer  came  abreast  of  him,  and  then  putting  his  arms 
akimbo,  and  rocking  his  body  in  a  fashion  peculiar  to 
himself,  said,  with  inimitable  drollery,  "  Ain't  you  a  little 
late  ?  I  surrendered  about  an  hour  ago."  The  officer  was 
no  other  than  the  gallant  Ouster,  who  had  been  leading 
the  flanking  movement,  and  did  come  in  a  little  late  at  the 
death,  as  they  say  in  fox  hunting. 

The  things  which  most  surprised  General  Wise  at  the 
surrender  at  Appomattox  were  the  desire  of  the  Union 
soldiers  to  see  him  above  all  others ;  the  lack  of  any  evi 
dence  of  personal  malignity  shown  towards  him;  and 
the  large  number  of  his  foes  who  expressed  the  warmest 
interest  and  personal  regard  for  him.  Especially  was  this 
so  among  the  New  York  troops,  many  of  whom  were 
Irishmen,  who  seemed  to  have  retained  for  him  the  live 
liest  affection  for  his  fight  against  Know-Nothingisrn  in 
1855.  The  courtesy  of  two  young  officers  on  General 
Humphreys's  staff  made  a  deep  impression  upon  him,  and 
to  the  day  of  his  death  he  kept  their  card  stuck  in  the 
corner  of  the  shaving  glass  of  his  portable  dressing-case, 
where  it  still  remains.  They  sought  him  out,  made  them 
selves  known,  told  him  of  their  lifelong  admiration,  and 
begged  the  privilege  of  ministering  to  his  wants  in  any 
way  in  their  power.  He  thanked  them,  and  protested  that 
the  only  thing  he  needed  was  a  good  pocket-knife.  Soon 
after  their  departure  an  orderly  appeared  with  the  finest 
knife  to  be  procured,  and  a  hamper  of  the  choicest  delicacies 
obtainable.  The  names  of  these  young  officers  were  Lieu 
tenant  Stickney  and  Lieutenant  Feary.  Thirty  years  after 
ward,  his  son,  residing  in  New  York,  met  Lieutenant  Feary, 
who  recalled  the  incidents  of  Appomattox  with  great  vivid 
ness,  was  much  gratified  to  hear  that  General  Wise  had  pre 
served  the  card,  and,  speaking  of  the  impression  which  Wise 


SEIZURE   OF   ROLLESTON  371 

made  upon  him,  said  that  his  memory  always  reverted  to 
him  as  one  of  the  most  remarkable  men  he  ever  met. 

In  the  task  of  paroling  the  army,  General  Wise  was  also 
brought  into  constant  relations  with  the  late  General  John 
Gibbons,  who  conceived  for  him  the  highest  regard. 

Wise  remained  at  Appomattox  until  paroled,  and  on 
the  12th  of  April  proceeded  to  Halifax  Court-House,  the 
home  of  his  son,  the  Rev.  Henry  A.  Wise,  who  was  the 
rector  of  the  Episcopal  Church  at  that  place.  After  a 
visit  of  some  weeks  at  the  home  of  his  son  he  made  his 
way  on  horseback  to  Mecklenburg  County,  where  he  visited 
two  friends  of  former  days,  —  Captain  Robert  Y.  Overby, 
who  resided  near  the  Buffalo  Lithia  Springs,  and  the  Hon. 
Mark  Alexander,  whose  home  was  also  near  by.  The 
country  throughout  south-side  Virginia  presented  a  sad 
aspect  at  this  time;  for,  in  addition  to  the  devastations  of 
war,  straggling  parties  of  Sheridan's  cavalry  continued  to 
pillage  the  homes  of  the  farmers,  and  had  carried  off  num 
bers  of  horses  and  live-stock. 

A  few  months  after  the  capture  of  Roanoke  Island,  in 
February,  1862,  the  Confederate  troops  had  been  compelled, 
in  consequence,  to  evacuate  Norfolk,  as  they  were  menaced 
by  the  force  of  the  enemy  to  the  southward,  as  well  as  by 
that  at  Fortress  Monroe.  About  a  year  later  the  United 
States  authorities  took  possession  of  Wise's  farm  called 
Rolleston,  on  the  eastern  branch  of  the  Elizabeth  River, 
which  they  continued  to  occupy  after  the  cessation  of 
hostilities,  having  established  a  colored  school  there,  and 
quartered  large  numbers  of  negroes  on  the  place  under 
the  auspices  of  the  Freedman's  Bureau.  Thus,  after 
laying  down  his  arms  at  Appomattox,  he  found  himself, 
at  the  age  of  fifty-nine  years,  a  prisoner  of  war  on  parole, 
impoverished  and  without  a  home ;  and  although  he  em 
ployed  the  Hon.  John  S.  Millson,  a  prominent  attorney 


372  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

of  Norfolk,  to  represent  him,  there  appeared  to  be  little 
prospect  at  that  time  of  recovering  his  property.  From 
Mecklenburg  County  he  proceeded  to  the  home  of  a  friend 
in  Isle  of  Wight,  whence  he  wrote,  on  May  30,  to  his  son- 
in-law,  Dr.  Garnett :  — 

"...  My  land  has  been  advertised,  but  I  hope  to  have  it 
yet  and  have  retained  Millson  as  my  attorney,  and  will 
wait  until  William  Parker  comes  back  from  the  Eastern 
Shore,  before  I  go  to  Norfolk.  I  am  enjoying  myself  here 
catching  fish  and  crabs.  I  will  try  to  send  you  some. 
We  caught  a  rockfish  yesterday  weighing  seven  and  one- 
half  pounds  and  one  to-day,  twelve  pounds.  John l  went  to 
Smithfield  to-day  and  took  the  oath  under  my  advice,  with 
instructions  to  keep  it  sacredly.  I,  of  course,  have  not 
and  will  not  take  it,  until  I  know  my  full  status  before 
and  after  taking  it,  and  I  am  not  sure  that  I  will  be  per 
mitted  to  take  it.  I  shall  not  ask  to  do  so.  The  negroes 
here  and  on  the  peninsula  are  allowed  every  license  at 
present,  but  will  soon  be  put  to  work.  Some  gentlemen 
just  arrived  here  from  Elizabeth  City  informed  me  that 
President  Davis  is  undoubtedly  in  irons,  and  they  say  it  is 
reported  that  General  Robert  E.  Lee  is  arrested.  This  is 
but  to  terrify  the  people  of  the  South,  and  I  have  no  fear,  — 
nothing  but  total  impoverishment  and  the  loss  of  National 
Republican  liberty.  For  myself  I  fear  nothing,  be  the  con 
sequences  what  they  may.  I  shall  carefully  and  conscien 
tiously  abide  my  parole,  and  not  attempt  to  escape  any  fate 
that  may  befall  me,  and  shall  walk  abroad  as  best  I  can, 
with  the  purpose  not  to  leave  my  county,  or  the  State  of 
Virginia.  Tell  Mary  I  received  her  letter  on  getting  here, 
dated  since  yours.  Give  her  my  blessing  for  herself  and 
children,  and  say  she  must  write  regularly  to  me  through 

1  His  son  John  Sergeant  Wise. 


RESTORATION   OF  ROLLESTON  373 

Mr.  A.  G.  Newton,  Atlantic  Hotel,  Norfolk ;  or  to  White 
and  Sales,  Norfolk.     God  bless  you  all." 

Wise  arrived  in  Norfolk  on  the  28th  of  June,  and  on  the 
day  following  addressed  an  application  to  General  How 
ard,  setting  forth  that  his  home  had  been  seized  by  the 
government  authorities,  and  requesting  that  it  be  restored 
to  him  in  accordance  with  the  terms  of  his  parole,  he  hav 
ing  surrendered  on  the  condition  that  he  be  allowed  "  to 
return  to  his  home  and  to  remain  there  unmolested  in  all 
respects,  as  long  as  he  obeyed  the  laws."  This  appli 
cation  was  later  on  returned,  with  the  endorsement  of 
Generals  Mann  and  Terry  (the  former  commanding  the 
sub-district  of  Norfolk  and  the  latter  the  department  of 
Virginia)  to  the  effect  that  he  would  "be  treated  as  a 
Rebel  prisoner  of  war,  with  no  rights  that  he  [Terry]  is 
bound  to  respect,  save  those  appertaining  to  a  person  in  that 
condition  "  ;  and  further  that  he  "  had  not  been  pardoned 
by  the  President " ;  and  that  he  had  abandoned  his  home 
"  in  order  that  he  might,  to  better  advantage,  engage  in 
rebellion  and  civil  war."  It  seems  strange  that  even  at 
this  day  there  are  to  be  found  those  who  approve  of  such 
acts  of  confiscation,  but  in  the  "Life  of  William  Lloyd 
Garrison," 1  published  by  his  children,  we  are  told  that : 
"  The  dramatic  incidents  of  the  war  had  been  many  and 
striking,  and  each  month  brought  its  fresh  example  of 
retributive  justice,  of  strange  contrast  and  coincidence. 
There  was  the  occupation  of  General  Lee's  estate  at 
Arlington  as  a  freedman's  village  (with  its  Garrison  and 
Lovejoy  streets)  and  national  cemetery ;  of  John  Tyler's 
and  Henry  A.  Wise's  residences,  by  schools  for  colored 
children  —  the  daughter  of  John  Brown  teaching  in  the 
latter,  with  her  father's  portrait  hanging  on  the  wall,"  etc. 

i  "  Life  of  Garrison,"  The  Century  Co.,  Vol.  IV.  page  133. 


374  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

The  so-called  "  retributive  justice "  continued  in  Wise's 
case  for  several  years  after  the  war,  when,  in  1868,  by  an 
order  obtained  from  General  Canby,  his  home  was  restored 
to  him.  The  estate  in  the  meanwhile  had  been  stripped  of 
nearly  all  its  timber,  while  the  fences  and  many  of  the  out 
buildings  had  been  destroyed  by  the  negroes.  Prior  to  its 
occupancy  by  the  protege's  of  the  Freedman's  Bureau,  the 
furniture,  bric-a-brac,  pictures,  and  household  articles  of 
every  sort  had  been  seized  by  the  military  authorities,  and 
a  large  quantity  of  them  carried  to  Fortress  Monroe,  for 
the  use  of  the  garrison  quartered  there.  In  the  summer 
of  1866,  Wise  obtained  an  order  from  General  Schofield  for 
the  recovery  of  these  articles  and  sent  his  nephew  Lewis 
Warrington  Wise,  along  with  an  old  housekeeper  who  had 
resided  many  years  in  the  family,  to  Old  Point,  in  order 
to  identify  them.  Upon  his  arrival  at  Fortress  Monroe, 
on  August  30,  Mr.  L.  W.  Wise  presented  this  order  to 
General  Miles,  the  officer  in  charge  of  the  post,  who  stated 
that  he  was  on  the  eve  of  leaving  for  a  short  while  and 
would  be  succeeded  in  command  by  General  Henry  S.  Bur 
ton,  and  suggested  that  he  (Mr.  Wise)  wait  until  his  suc 
cessor  was  installed,  which  the  former  concluded  to  do. 
Every  courtesy  was  extended  by  this  last-named  officer, 
and  full  opportunity  afforded  him  to  search  the  officers' 
quarters,  where  numerous  pieces  of  furniture,  books,  china, 
and  household  articles  were  found.  A  year  later  such  of 
the  articles  as  remained  were  delivered  to  one  of  his  sons 
by  General  William  Hayes,  then  in  command  of  Fortress 
Monroe. 

Prior  to  the  war  Wise  had  collected  a  number  of  valua 
ble  oil  paintings,  most  of  which  were  the  gifts  of  friends, 
and  pieces  of  bric-a-brac,  which  were  left  at  his  farm  when 
it  was  suddenly  abandoned  in  the  spring  of  1862  at  the 
announcement  of  the  enemy's  approach.  Among  the  paint- 


ANECDOTE   OF   GENERAL   BUTLER  375 

ings  was  the  original  of  Herring's  "  Village  Blacksmith," 
which,  fortunately  enough,  was  cut  out  of  the  frame  by 
one  of  his  sons,  and  wrapped  on  a  roller.  Wise  had  come 
into  possession  of  the  picture  as  the  successful  subscriber 
to  the  American  Art  Union,  and  after  the  war,  when 
much  in  need  of  money,  sold  it  for  fifteen  hundred  dollars. 
It  was  recently  sold  in  England  for  many  times  that  sum. 
He  was  not  so  fortunate,  however,  in  saving  others,  and  a 
valuable  set  of  Dutch  drinking  scenes  by  Teniers,  and  an 
exquisite  Bacchante  by  Pauline  Laurent,  went  to  adorn 
the  walls  of  some  unknown  lovers  of  fine  art.  Some  years 
ago,  the  last-named  picture  was  discovered  in  Washington 

at  the  home  of  General ,  who  was  induced  to  return 

it  by  a  suggestive  note  from  General  Schofield,  then  the 
Secretary  of  War.  Various  pieces  of  bric-a-brac,  too,  have 
turned  up  from  time  to  time  in  different  quarters.  One 
day  in  Washington,  about  fifteen  years  ago,  General  B.  F. 
Butler,  who  was  associated  with  John  S.  Wise  in  a  lawsuit, 
turned  to  the  latter,  with  whom  he  was  quite  friendly,  and 
remarked,  "  Wise,  it's  very  curious,  but  I  have  a  cup  at 
my  home  made  from  the  timber  of  the  old  Constitution, 
and  which  has  your  father's  name  engraved  upon  it;  it 
was  presented  to  him  by  Captain  Percival.  I  cannot,  for 
the  life  of  me,  imagine  how  I  came  by  it."  "It  is  not 
curious  at  all.  I'll  explain  that  to  you  very  easily," 
replied  the  other.  "You  stole  it  when  you  were  down 
at  Norfolk  during  the  war.  Send  it  back,  and  purge 
your  conscience  to  that  extent,  at  least,  General."  The 
pair  laughed  heartily,  and  General  Butler  shortly  after 
ward  returned  the  cup. 

During  the  summer  of  1865  Wise's  name,  along  with 
those  of  General  Lee,  Mr.  Davis,  and  a  number  of  other 
prominent  Confederates,  was  presented  to  the  grand  jury 
of  the  United  States  District  Court  at  Norfolk,  and  in- 


376  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

dictments  for  treason  were  found  against  them.  Although 
extremely  anxious  that  he  might  be  brought  to  trial,  no 
further  steps  were  ever  taken  by  the  authorities  and  a 
nolle  prosequi  was  subsequently  entered. 

In  a  letter  to  General  Lee,  dated  Richmond,  August  5, 
1865,  Wise  wrote :"...!  have  not  applied  for  pardon. 
First,  because  I  cannot  consent  to  countenance  4  Test  Oaths.' 
Second,  because  those  tendered  to  me  I  cannot  conscien 
tiously  take  under  my  present  impressions  of  their  force 
and  effect.  Third,  because  I  was  earnest  and  honest  in 
my  convictions  that  I  was  right  and  I  am  not  yet  con 
vinced  to  the  contrary  and  cannot  admit  therefore,  under 
oath,  either  impliedly  or  expressly,  that  I  was  wrong,  by 
the  very  fact  of  petitioning  for  pardon.  Pardon  implies, 
ex  vi  termini,  guilt,  crime  —  in  this  case  the  high  crime  of 
treason.  I  don't  admit  it  and  can't  imply  it  by  any  act  of 
mine.  I  was  not  a  traitor  to  my  country  and  cannot  be 
come  a  traitor  to  myself.  By  this  I  don't  mean  to  censure 
comrades  who  have  petitioned  for  pardon ;  in  such  extreme 
cases  as  ours  each  must  judge  for  himself  alone.  On  the 
one  hand,  whilst  my  holding  out  may  seem  to  reflect  on 
the  course  of  comrades  who  have  given  in  to  the  terms  of 
amnesty;  on  the  other,  their  giving  in  will  certainly  in 
crease  the  chances  and  degrees  of  pains  and  penalties 
against  any  of  us  who  hold  out.  Not  to  follow  your  ex 
ample  either  way  will  reflect  upon  any  officer  whom  you 
have  commanded.  It  is  important,  therefore,  to  me  to 
know  what  your  action  has  been  and  will  be  in  this  re 
spect.  ...  I  have,  I  know,  no  claims  on  your  attention, 
other  than  the  respect  and  gratitude  of  one  who  ever 
devoted  his  best  endeavors  and  improved  every  oppor 
tunity  allowed  him,  from  first  to  last  of  our  great  but 
vain  struggle,  to  make  it  successful  and  glorious  under 
your  leadership." 


THE    PROCLAMATION   OF    AMNESTY  377 

In  reply  to  the  above  inquiry  General  Lee  wrote  from  his 
brother's  home,  near  Cartersville,  in  Cumberland  County, 
under  date  of  August  21,  1865 :  — 

".  .  .  As  you  ask  to  be  informed  what  my  course  has 
been  under  the  proclamation  of  the  President  of  the  United 
States  of  the  29th  of  May,  1865,  I  would  state  that  in  ac 
cordance  with  one  of  its  provisions,  I  applied,  on  the  13th 
of  June,  for  the  benefits  of  amnesty,  and  the  restoration  of 
all  rights  and  privileges  extended  to  those  in  its  terms,  but 
have  not  yet  received  an  answer  to  my  application." 

It  is  said  that  General  Lee,  in  view  of  the  position  he 
occupied  among  the  Southern  people,  deemed  it  best  to 
pursue  a  course  which  he  considered  would  tend  to  allay 
all  sectional  feeling ;  but  upon  being  indicted  at  Norfolk, 
he  withdrew  his  application.  Wise  never  applied  for  the 
benefits  held  out  in  the  President's  proclamation,  nor  took 
an  oath  of  any  sort ;  nor  did  he  ever  cast  a  vote  in  any 
election  after  the  war,  his  disabilities  never  having  been 
removed.  The  amnesty  act  which  was  subsequently  passed 
by  Congress  he  described  as  "  not  amnesty  but  damn  nasty" 

"The  United  States  have  not  enough  money  to  bribe 
me,"  he  wrote  to  a  New  York  editor  in  1870,  "  nor  force 
enough  to  drive  me  to  take,  touch,  or  taste  a  test  oath,  that 
most  odious  instrument  of  tyranny ;  '  before  I  would  per 
mit  my  forefinger  and  thumb  to  touch  the  pen  to  sign  it, 
my  right  hand  should  be  cut  off  at  my  wrist,  and  be  nailed 
to  a  guide-post  to  point  the  way  to  a  gibbet.'  So  Petti- 
grew  said  concerning  the  test  oaths  of  nullification  in  South 
Carolina,  and  so  I  say  to  the  test  oaths  prescribed  by  Con 
gress.  I  said  all  I  meant,  meant  all  I  said,  and  tried  my 
best  to  do  all  I  said  and  meant  for  4the  lost  cause.'  What 
is  '  the  lost  cause '  ?  Ah !  would  only  that  the  host  of 
voters  in  the  United  States  would  4  do  truth  and  come  to 
the  light,'  and  see  that  the  Confederacy  is  not  the  only 


378  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

cause  lost.  The  Constitution  is  lost;  the  Union  defined 
by  it  is  lost;  the  liberty  of  States  and  their  people,  which 
they  both  at  first  and  for  half  a  century  guarded,  are  lost. 
I  am  anxious  only  that  the  truth  should  be  told  and  felt. 
I  wish  to  live  only  a  little  while  to  see  the  true  spirit  of 
constitutional  liberty  and  laws  under  a  free  republic  of 
States  and  their  people  revived,  and  I  pray  to  be  ready  to 
go  then,  when  my  only  Master  in  the  universe  calls.  I  am 
willing,  freely  willing,  and  more  than  anxious  that  all  men 
of  every  race  shall  be  as  free  as  I  wish,  or  claim  to  be  ;  but, 
whilst  slaves  are  being  made  free,  I  protest  against  freemen 
being  made  slaves !  " 

On  account  of  the  seizure  and  possession  of  his  farm  by 
the  government  authorities,  which  they  continued  to  hold 
until  the  year  1868,  Wise  concluded  not  to  return  to  the 
vicinity  of  Norfolk,  and  mainly  on  his  wife's  account  de 
cided  to  locate  in  Richmond,  where  he  proposed  resuming 
the  practice  of  law  in  order  to  support  himself  and  family. 
During  the  fall  of  1865  he  resided  temporarily  in  a  house 
owned  by  his  son-in-law,  Dr.  Garnett,  but  in  January,  1866, 
rented  a  dwelling  in  Manchester,  on  the  south  side  of  the 
James  River  from  Richmond,  where  he  lived  that  year. 
This  house  was  surrounded  by  a  large  yard,  with  shade 
trees  and  a  good  garden,  and  here  he  could  not  only 
indulge  his  passion  for  gardening,  but  be  much  more 
comfortable  in  his  straitened  financial  condition  than  in 
Richmond,  where  living  was  more  expensive. 

On  December  5,  1865,  he  wrote  from  Richmond  to  Mrs. 
Garnett:  — 

"Yours  of  the  3d  instant  was  received  by  me  to-day 
and  touched  me  sweetly,  though  mournfully,  and  all  your 
dutiful  conduct,  my  child,  has  ever  affected  my  heart.  I 
had  no  birthday  cake,  no  gathering  of  my  household,  for 
now,  alas !  I  have  none,  and  but  a  bare  remembrance  of 


CHANGED    CONDITIONS   IN   VIRGINIA  379 

what  I  once  had,  and  how  bare  I  am  of  every  comfort  now. 
I  did  not,  therefore,  regret  your  absence,  though  your 
companionship  is  always  pleasant  to  me  whenever  we  can 
be  happy  together." 

And  on  December  24  of  the  same  year,  he  wrote  as 
follows :  — 

"  Here  I  am  down  in  the  dining  room  by  a  good  fire, 
this  Sabbath  morning  before  Christmas,  full  of  mist  and 
rain  and  dirt  and  black  mire  under  feet,  whilst  all,  as 
usual,  are  not  out  of  bed.  I  am  thinking  of  you,  and 
a  thousand  things  full  of  sad  memories  and  yet  not  with 
out  some  hopes.  Your  letter  to  Sister  [his  wife]  and 
others  for  the  past  week,  and  the  Doctor's  to  his  brother, 
of  which  he  told  me  last  night,  seem  to  indicate  that  you 
and  he  are  not  happy  in  Washington.  I  beg  you  not  to 
repine.  I  don't  think  that  Richmond  will  for  years  offer 
pleasant  and  profitable  homes  for  any  one  of  the  old  Vir 
ginia  people — God  bless  them.  The  professions  are  clogged 
and  the  people  are  poor  and  there  is  nothing  but  borrowed 
capital  wherewith  to  pay,  and  that  is  very  scarce ;  and  the 
people  are  changed.  The  same  people  are  not  the  same 
they  were  before  the  war,  and  I  see  not  how  this  state  of 
things  is  to  improve  for  a  year  or  more.  So,  my  child,  try 
to  be  content  and  reconciled  to  your  lot  in  a  land  you  don't 
prefer ;  there  is  no  preferred  land  now." 

While  he  felt  keenly  the  changed  condition  of  affairs 
in  Virginia,  especially  as  regarded  himself,  he  was  not 
a  man  to  sit  idle  and  lament  his  broken  fortunes;  and 
early  in  1866  we  find  him  resolutely  at  work,  engaged  in 
the  practice  of  his  profession.  That  this  was  not  an  easy 
task  for  a  man  who  had  abandoned  the  law  years  before 
needs  no  proof;  but  it  is  difficult  for  us  at  the  present  time 
to  appreciate  the  embarrassments  under  which  Southern 
men  past  the  meridian  of  life  labored,  who  had  to  begin 


380  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

life  anew  in  1865.  The  rooted  land  was  there,  it  is  true ; 
but  in  all  else  how  changed !  Not  only  did  there  exist 
that  indefinable,  as  well  as  apparent,  sense  of  desola 
tion  which  characterizes  a  people  defeated  in  a  civil  con 
flict;  but  the  end  of  an  era  had  come;  a  civilization  had 
been  overthrown,  and  "  Military  District  No.  1 "  was  to 
take  the  place  of  what  once  had  been  Virginia.  To 
give  up  all  one's  previous  habits  of  thought,  and  to  see 
those  things  profaned  which  hitherto  we  have  regarded 
as  sacred,  is  not  easy  even  in  early  manhood ;  but 
to  the  aged,  the  ordeal  is  rendered  many  times  more 
difficult.  The  ante-bellum  Virginian  loved  above  all 
things  the  freedom  of  the  country,  and  "elbow  room," 
as  he  would  have  expressed  it,  and  for  a  man  of  Wise's 
temperament,  in  his  sixtieth  year,  to  take  up  the  hum 
drum  routine  of  the  modern  professional  man  was  far 
from  congenial  to  his  taste  and  inclinations.  With  the 
energy  characteristic  of  him,  however,  he  devoted  himself 
assiduously  to  his  profession,  and  before  a  great  while 
enjoyed  a  fairly  lucrative  practice.  For  some  years  after 
the  war  he  was  associated  with  his  nephew  George  D. 
Wise  and  Judge  E.  H.  Fitzhugh,  but  in  1889  dissolved 
his  connection  with  them,  and  entered  into  a  partnership 
with  his  son  John  Sergeant  Wise,  who  had  come  to  the  bar 
in  1867.  That  partnership  continued  until  his  death.  It 
is  probably  no  exaggeration  to  say  that  a  lawyer  has  never 
long  engaged  in  political  life  without  relaxing  in  some 
degree  the  habit  of  close  legal  reasoning ;  and  what  Judge 
William  D.  Shipman  has  declared  of  Roscoe  Conkling  is 
in  an  even  greater  degree  true  of  Wise ;  namely,  that  his 
public  career  had  "deprived  him  of  much  of  the  whole 
some  discipline  which  his  ardent  and  exuberant  nature  so 
much  needed  to  compact  his  faculties,  and  steady  and  clarify 
his  judgment." 


CHANGED   CONDITIONS   IN   VIRGINIA  381 

"However  little  active  and  constant  employment  in  the 
legislative  or  executive  departments  of  our  government 
may  demoralize  the  ethical  side  of  a  man's  nature,  there 
can  be  little  doubt  that  it  is  unfavorable  to  '  that  purifica 
tion  of  the  intellectual  eye '  so  important  to  a  practising 
lawyer."1  Wise,  like  Conkling,  had  given  up  the  best 
years  of  his  life  to  politics,  and  though  better  known  in 
that  connection,  was  a  successful  practitioner ;  for,  though 
he  had  suffered  the  disadvantages  above  named,  he  was, 
nevertheless,  well  grounded  in  the  principles  of  law.  It 
can  be  said  of  him  that  his  client's  cause  was  his  own,  and 
he  threw  into  the  contest  whatever  of  earnestness  and 
learning  he  possessed.  The  same  independence  and  fear 
lessness  which  were  characteristic  of  him  in  the  other  walks 
of  life  were  illustrated  at  the  bar.  And  while  he  had 
become  more  or  less  unfamiliar  with  the  forms  of  legal 
procedure,  he  retained  first  rank  for  his  knowledge  and 
power  of  enforcing  the  legal  principles  of  his  cases. 
Generals  Stoneman,  Canby,  and  Terry,  when  in  com 
mand  at  Richmond,  frequently  sent  for  General  Wise,  and 
sought  his  counsel  and  advice,  for,  while  he  delighted  to 
call  himself  "  an  unreconstructed  rebel,"  his  knowledge  of 
the  people  was  unequalled;  his  advice  was  always  sound; 
the  course  which  he  recommended  was  sure  to  be  honora 
ble,  and  no  man  was  more  trusted  by  friend  and  foe  alike. 

At  the  close  of  the  reconstruction  era  in  Virginia,  and 
when  the  military  was  at  last  to  become  subordinate  to 
the  civil  authority,  a  conflict  arose  in  the  city  of  Richmond 
over  the  office  of  mayor,  between  George  Chahoon,  a  mili 
tary  appointee,  and  Henry  K.  Ellyson,  who  had  been  elected 
by  the  city  council.  For  several  days  the  city  was  in  a 
state  of  disorder,  each  claimant  endeavoring  to  exercise 

1  Memorial  sketch  of  Roscoe  Conkling  by  William  D.  Shipman. 


382  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

the  functions  of  mayor ;  and  the  matter  was  finally  taken  to 
the  courts.  Wise  accepted  employment  as  one  of  Chahoon's 
counsel.  The  case  arose  at  a  time  when  the  Virginia  people 
had  long  chafed  under  military  rule,  and  under  circum 
stances  which  almost  precipitated  a  riot  and  race  war,  and 
Wise  received  unstinted  abuse  for  appearing  as  an  advo 
cate  of  Chahoon's  claim  to  the  office.  At  one  time  he  was 
housed  with  his  client  in  one  of  the  police  stations  of  the 
city,  surrounded  by  an  infuriated  populace  and  a  body  of 
the  Ellyson  police,  who  had  cut  off  the  Chahoon  contingent 
from  food  and  water,  and  where  his  own  life  was  by  no 
means  safe.  He  unhesitatingly  expressed  his  fearless  scorn 
and  contempt  for  the  spirit  which  would  deny  a  litigant 
the  best  attorney  he  could  afford  to  employ,  and  gloried  in 
his  defiance  of  the  clamor  against  him.  The  case  was 
finally  decided  by  the  Court  of  Appeals  of  Virginia  in 
April,  1870,  and  the  desire  to  hear  the  reading  of  the 
opinion  attracted  a  large  crowd  to  the  court-room,  located 
in  the  Capitol  building.  The  strain  upon  the  floors  proved 
too  great,  and  a  disaster  occurred  in  which  fifty-eight  people 
were  killed.  Fortunately  for  Wise,  he  was  not  present  at 
the  session  of  the  court,  having  been  detained  by  an  acci 
dental  circumstance  at  his  office. 

From  the  end  of  the  Civil  War  up  to  the  date  of  his 
death,  Wise  was  never  again  a  participant  in  public  affairs, 
although  an  anxious  observer  of  events  and  an  occasional 
contributor  to  the  press  during  the  painful  period  of  dis 
order  and  maladministration  which  followed  the  clash  of 
arms.  On  February  12,  1866,  he  wrote  from  Richmond 
to  his  old  friend  Hon.  Fernando  Wood  of  New  York,  as 
follows :  — 

"The  past  and  the  present  both  justify  me  to  myself 
in  appealing  to  you,  sir,  for  such  information  and  coun 
sel,  if  you  have  it,  as  will  relieve  my  mind  and  heart 


CORRESPONDENCE   OF   FERNANDO    WOOD  383 

of  the  painful  doubt  and  anxiety  which  oppress  them 
respecting  the  fate  not  only  of  the  Southern  States  and 
people,  but  of  the  Republic,  and  of  the  civil  liberty  which 
it  was  created  to  establish  and  defend.  My  own  views  are, 
in  a  word,  nothing  in  my  present  position  to  be  heeded  even, 
much  less  to  be  made  known  with  any  hope  that  they  would 
prevail.  You  know  my  position  before  the  war :  4  To  fight 
in  the  Union,  under  the  express  letter  of  the  Constitution 
—  to  take  up  arms  by  the  sovereign  authority  of  States  — 
to  repeal  invasion  and  to  suppress  'insurrection.' 

"  I  assented  to  secession  on  the  grounds  of  Mr.  Madi 
son,  that  it  was  at  most  but  a  revolutionary  remedy  in  the 
conflict  of  sovereignties  among  the  States  of  the  Union; 
that  if  successful  it  would  preserve  constitutional  limita 
tions,  defend  the  right  of  self-government,  and  secure  civil 
liberty;  and  if  unsuccessful,  that  it  would  leave  us  at 
least  as  we  were  ante  bellum,  under  the  aegis  of  the  Con 
stitution  of  the  United  States,  as  the  supreme  law  of  the 
nation  and  all  its  parts,  the  Confederate  States  remaining 
bodies  politic,  or  sovereign  States,  still  in  the  Union. 

"  The  revolution  of  sovereignties  was  unsuccessful,  never 
consummated  Confederate  independence,  and  never  for  one 
moment  took  a  single  State  out  of  the  Union,  but  left  each 
and  all  as  they  were  under  the  Federal  Constitution,  bound 
by  its  compacts  and  protected  by  its  provisions  and  guar 
antees.  By  the  result  of  the  war  the  Union  was  not 
restored,  for  it  was  never  destroyed  or  broken ;  it  was  not 
to  be  4  reconstructed,'  for  it  was  already  constructed  by  the 
Constitution ;  States  were  still  States ;  citizens  were  still 
citizens ;  Federal  rights  and  relations  were  still  the  same ; 
obligations  and  duties  were  the  same ;  privileges  and  pro 
tection  and  penalties  were  all  the  same,  just  simply  because 
the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  was  still  the  same,  and 
the  Union  was  still  the  same,  as  neither  had  been  destroyed, 


384  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

though  the  former  was  heavily  assailed,  and  the  latter  had 
been  often  violated ;  the  one  stood  the  shock  and  test  of 
arms,  and  the  other  still  reigns  the  supreme  law.  Such, 
fairly  stated,  I  apprehend  and  hope  to  be  the  position  of 
President  Johnson,  founded  on  the  laws  of  civil  war  among 
sovereign  States. 

"  Can  you  inform  me,  then,  why,  that  war  having  ceased, 
peace  has  not  been  proclaimed  ?  Why  the  writ  of  habeas 
corpus  has  not  been  restored  ?  Why  civil  jurisdiction  has 
not  been  allowed  to  take  cognizance  of  all  cases  belonging 
to  the  courts  of  law  and  equity  under  the  Constitution  ? 
Is  the  war  power  to  continue  after  war  itself  has  ceased  ? 
Are  arms  to  be  employed  still,  long  after  the  ordinary  pro 
cess  of  the  judicial  tribunals  can  be  executed?  Are  the 
civil  laws  to  be  continued  suspended  ?  Are  original  and 
sovereign  States  to  be  provincialized  and  '  territorialized '  ? 
Is  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  itself  to  remain  sus 
pended  until  some  power  or  other  can  or  shall  form  a  new 
National  Government?  I  might  add  inquiry  to  inquiry 
further,  but  these  are  enough,  and  I  confess  to  you  that  I 
have  seen  nothing  from  any  quarter  as  yet  shedding  light 
on  these  momentous  questions.  Whether  I  look  to  the 
Federal  Executive,  or  Congress,  or  Judiciary,  or  to  the 
country  at  large,  all  is  dark.  I  see  a  lurid  light  only  in 
the  camps  of  the  army,  still  surrounding  our  very  homes 
and  firesides.  Can  you,  from  your  stand,  point  me  to  any 
clear,  unclouded  prospect  to  cheer  the  patriot  heart  which 
longs  to  see  the  old  Union  and  old  Constitution  respected, 
and  honored,  and  obeyed  as  they  really  exist,  and  have 
ever  since  1787  existed,  without  any  reconstruction  ? 

"A  year  ago  you  implored  the  Southern  people  to 
return  to  the  Union  on  a  basis  of  equality  and  fraternity. 
This  you  did  from  the  hall  of  the  House  of  Representa 
tives,  where  we  have  no  representatives  now,  whilst  we  are 


HON.    FERNANDO   WOOD'S   LETTER  385 

paying  heavy  excise  duties  and  other  taxes.  During  the 
war  you  were  manfully  opposed  to  it,  but  you  were  for  the 
return  of  the  South,  and  for  the  Union  on  an  amicable 
adjustment  of  all  questions  at  issue ;  you  do  not  believe 
that  the  differences  existing  were  either  irreconcilable,  or 
to  be  determined  and  adjusted  only  by  the  sword.  The 
main  difference,  that  of  slavery,  has  been  since  determined 
forever  vi  concitata  belli.  I  am  convinced  that  it  could 
never  have  been  settled  in  any  other  way,  and  that  for  that 
reason  the  war  itself  was  providential ;  it  was  God's  war, 
and  who  on  earth  dares  gainsay  it.  It  has  fixed  the  Union 
firm  on  its  base,  unless  it  has  unfixed  the  Constitution. 
But  if  the  war  has  destroyed  the  latter,  it  has  destroyed 
the  former,  forever.  Why  have  you  been  silent  so  long  ? 
What  is  the  state  of  national  affairs,  present  and  prospec 
tive  ?  Let  me  hear  from  you  soon." 

Mr.  Wood  replied,  February  19th,  1866,  as  follows :  - 
"  You  say,  correctly,  that  I  have  been  silent  on  national 
politics  since  my  speech  of  February  last,  in  Congress, 
in  which  I  implored  the  Southern  people  to  return  to 
the  Union.  I  have  been  purposely  so.  During  my  ab 
sence  in  Europe  last  spring  and  summer,  the  war  abruptly 
closed,  the  Executive  was  more  abruptly  changed,  and  the 
consequences  of  these  events  precipitated  upon  the  coun 
try  a  condition  of  things  to  comprehend  which  few  minds 
were  capable.  I  thought  that  silent  observation  would  the 
better  enable  me  to  understand  and  appreciate  this  new 
order  of  public  affairs,  and  to  reach  a  conclusion  which, 
however  unimportant  to  others,  would  at  least  be  satisfac 
tory  to  myself.  I  have  reached  this  conclusion,  and  hav 
ing  been  thus  called  upon  in  your  letter  of  the  12th  inst., 
will  give  it  in  reply.  The  form  of  government  established 
by  the  present  Constitution  was  not  the  first  created  after 
independence,  nor  was  it  republican.  The  first  was  that 
2c 


386  THE   LIFE    OF   HENRY    A.   WISE 

established  by  the  Articles  of  Confederation,  making  a 
league  of  colonies,  which,  in  1788,  was  replaced  by  the 
present  form,  enlarging  the  central  authority,  but  retain 
ing  much  of  the  Confederate  characteristics  ;  but  this  was, 
nevertheless,  essentially  a  Confederacy,  and  not  a  Republic, 
in  the  true  sense.  The  Republic  form  4  is  that  of  a  State 
in  which  the  sovereign  power  is  in  the  representatives 
elected  by  the  people.'  This  was  not  nor  is  yet  our  system 
according  to  the  theory  of  State  government.  The  States 
are  republican,  but  not  the  Federal  Union.  Two  sover 
eign  powers  cannot  exist  within  the  same  government.  If 
sovereignty  was  retained  by  the  States,  it  could  not  have 
been  imparted  to  the  Federal  authority.  Opposite  views 
as  to  the  relative  strength  of  these  authorities  have  existed 
ever  since.  There  was  sufficient  in  the  anomaly  of  the 
system  to  divide  statesmen  and  parties  as  to  its  nature. 
Opposing  sectional  differences  on  this  and  other  essential 
questions  increased  with  time,  and  finally  plunged  the 
whole  country  into  war.  No  one  difference  caused  the 
war.  There  was  a  combination  of  antagonism,  including 
those  of  a  social,  commercial,  and  partisan  character.  All 
of  these  questions  were  issues  between  the  parties  to  the 
contest.  An  appeal  was  taken  to  the  highest  of  all  human 
tribunals,  and  a  decision  has  been  rendered  from  which 
there  can  be  no  further  appeal.  We  are  concluded  by  the 
result.  It  is  true  the  Constitution  remains  as  it  was ;  and 
it  is  also  true  that,  though  the  war  power  has  ceased,  the 
war  power  is  still  invoked,  and  the  South  kept  in  a  state 
inconsistent  with  peace  and  repugnant  to  the  Constitution. 
But  I  look  upon  this  as  but  the  period  which  intervenes 
between  the  rendering  of  final  judgment  and  the  settle 
ment  of  the  case  as  to  the  precise  points  which  have  been 
decided.  It  is  an  interregnum,  to  be  followed  by  such 
measures  as  will  adapt  the  fundamental  form  of  govern- 


CHANGED   CONDITIONS   IN   THE   SOUTH  387 

ment  to  the  new  order  of  things;  and  incorporate  into 
our  system  the  principles  thus  established  by  force  of  arms. 
As  you  well  state,  both  State  sovereignty  and  slavery  have 
been  determined  against.  For  the  former  we  must  here 
after  have  unity ;  for  the  latter  freedom.  Whether  you 
and  I  will  it  or  not,  or  whatever  may  be  men's  opinion  as 
to  the  true  construction  of  the  Constitution  with  reference 
to  these  two  great  questions,  it  is  folly  to  disguise  the  fact 
that  hereafter  there  can  be  no  such  issues.  The  new 
Americanism  opens  up  before  us,  and  common  sense  de 
mands  that  we  should  conform  to  it.  Now,  what  follows  ? 
State  sovereignty  being  dead,  unity  follows.  The  people 
of  the  whole  Union  are  one,  and  the  majority  is  that  one. 
This,  you  will  say,  is  consolidation,  and  so  it  is,  but  not  a 
consolidation  inconsistent  with  free  government  nor  with 
republicanism,  nor  does  it  imply  that  States,  as  such, 
shall  not  continue  North  and  South,  with  all  needful 
jurisdiction  over  domestic  rights.  Slavery  being  dead, 
freedom  follows.  This  is  one  of  the  difficulties  now  in 
the  way  of  the  complete  restoration  of  peace.  There  is  a 
doubt  in  the  minds  of  some  as  to  the  points  settled  by  the 
decision  on  this  question.  It  is  held,  on  the  one  side,  that 
it  means  something  more  than  merely  exemption  from 
physical  bondage,  that  it  has  been  determined  that  all  men 
shall  hereafter  be  free  and  equal,  comprehending  equality 
of  political  and  every  other  right  known  to  the  law.  An 
appeal  to  arms  to  decide  social  issues  is  the  most  radical 
of  all  measures,  and  we  should  not  be  surprised  if  the 
victors  should  seek  to  avail  themselves  of  the  advantage 
gained  to  carry  out  their  doctrines  to  the  extreme  extent 
which  the  opportunity  affords. 

"  I  note  what  you  say  as  to  the  present  lamentable  con 
dition  of  the  Southern  people,  and  admit  the  force  of  your 
description  of  their  oppression  and  deprivations.  How 


388  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY    A.   WISE 

could  it  be  otherwise?  The  storm  through  which  they 
have  just  emerged  may  have  disappeared,  but  not  its  effects. 
The  violence  of  that  hurricane  has  left  its  marks  deep  in 
the  recesses  of  the  Southern  heart.  Besides,  the  very  doubt 
to  which  I  have  referred  as  to  the  extent  of  the  application 
of  the  principles  settled  by  the  war,  produces  irritation  on 
one  side  and  oppression  on  the  other.  Until  these  are 
finally  disposed  of,  much  of  this  will  continue.  Nor  can 
executive  legislation  nor  judicial  action  prevent.  Time, 
and  time  alone,  can  restore  the  lost  rights  of  which  you 
complain.  But  this  time  will  be  very  much  curtailed  by 
a  speedy  realization  and  appreciation  of  the  fundamental 
change  effected. 

"The  South  has  not  lost  any  substantial  right  by  the 
war.  It  has  gained  much.  Its  homogeneity  and  unity 
with  the  people  of  the  whole  Union  have  been  secured. 
Sources  of  discontent  have  been  removed,  and  the  door 
opened  forever  for  the  establishment  of  fraternal  relations 
with  other  parts  of  the  Union,  not  heretofore  existing. 
She  cannot  be  kept  down.  Her  teeming  soil ;  her  climate 
of  rare  adaptability  to  culture ;  her  brave  and  generous 
population ;  her  peculiar  monopoly  of  an  indispensable 
product,  with  free  institutions,  and  free  intercourse  with 
all  the  world,  —  she  will  speedily  recover,  not  only  her 
ancient  prosperity,  but  possess  an  additional  advantage 
which  the  new  order  of  things  will  necessarily  promote. 

"  I  am  aware  that  there  are  positions  assumed  and 
declarations  made  in  this  letter  which  may  render  me 
liable  to  the  charge  of  inconsistency.  If  any  thus  accuse, 
let  them  remember  that  no  partisan  associations,  nor 
opinions  existing  before  and  during  the  war,  should  con 
tinue  when  the  whole  aspect  of  public  affairs  and  the 
promises  upon  which  they  were  founded  have  been  alto 
gether  changed.  I  was  opposed  to  the  abolition  of 


BETUKN   TO   BICHMOND  389 

slavery,  because  I  believed,  and  yet  believe,  that  as  it 
existed  in  the  Southern  States,  it  was  a  physical  blessing 
to  the  black  race.  I  was  opposed  to  the  war  for  the 
reasons  you  so  truthfully  state,  and  because  I  thought 
the  Union  could  be  maintained  without  bloodshed  —  that 
the  questions  at  issue  were  susceptible  of  amicable  adjust 
ment,  and  because  I  saw  that  the  South  would  be  van 
quished  and  overpowered,  and  reduced  to  a  state  of 
subjugated  dependence.  This  is  now  over.  Slavery  has 
been  abolished ;  the  war  is  ended.  The  great  questions 
which  made  issues  between  political  parties  have  ceased, 
and  a  new  and  entirely  different  order  of  public  affairs 
has  ensued.  My  desire  is  that  we  shall  realize  this 
change  and  conform  to  it.  It  is  folly  to  fight  over  the 
dead  past  when  the  live  present  and  the  great  future  open 
so  brightly  and  beautifully  before  us. 

"  I  want  America  to  fill  her  mission.  She  is  the  fixed 
corner-stone  of  universal  liberty  throughout  the  world. 
With  this  principle  laid  deep  and  broad  in  our  own 
institutions  it  should  be  our  aim  to  extend  it  to  those 
oppressed  elsewhere,  until  despotism  ceases,  not  only  on 
this  continent,  but  throughout  the  civilized  universe." 

During  the  autumn  of  1866,  Wise  resumed  his  residence 
in  Richmond,  having  rented  the  house  built  and  occupied 
by  Chief  Justice  Marshall  on  the  street  of  the  same  name. 
Here  he  installed  his  household  goods  and  gathered  his 
family  about  him.  On  December  23  of  this  year  he  wrote 
to  his  daughter,  Mrs.  Garnett,  as  follows :  — 

"  I  write  this  morning  that  my  letter  may  reach  you  in 
time  to  say  CA  Merry  Christmas  to  you  all,'  merry,  my  child, 
in  every  sense  of  peace  and  plenty,  and  especially  of  trust 
in  a  good  and  gracious  Providence.  We,  at  least,  are  spared, 
and  to  be  spared  is  an  unspeakable  blessing.  I  can't  help 
feeling  this  Sabbath,  after  the  years  of  sacking,  more  than 


390  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY    A.   WISE 

merely  grateful  that  not  one  of  mine  will  this  anniversary 
of  a  Saviour's  Birth  be  without  bread  and  something 
wherewith  to  be  joyful.  Let  us  be,  then,  happy  in  what 
we  have  left,  and  be  hopeful  that  we  are  spared  not  in 
vain.  I  begin  now  to  feel  that  there  are  a  peace  and  pleas 
ure  in  communing  with  you  more  as  a  companion  and  friend 
than  as  a  child,  or  younger  sister.  You,  Mary,  have  been 
with  me  now  many  years  a  companion  of  joy  and  grief, 
upon  which  we -can  together  look  back  not  without  many 
sacred  thoughts  of  solemn  sweetness ;  and  that  sweetness 
is  sweeter  than  the  'honey  or  honeycomb.'  I  have  this 
morning  been  thinking  of  my  earliest  family,  and  of  all 
the  little  ones  as  they  have  come  and  grown,  or  are  gone, 
and  of  whom  you  were  the  first  and  are  still  left.  For 
that  I  am  grateful,  my  child,  for  you  have  ever  been  a 
comfort  to  me.  I  wish  I  could  send  you  all  my  thoughts 
and  affections  and  love,  which  would  make  you  comforted ; 
but  you  know  them  all  and  can  dwell  upon  them  and  think 
of  them  and  cherish  them  with  me,  though  we  be  apart  so 
far.  Strengthen  yourself  by  improving  these  thoughts  and 
feelings  during  this  solemn  time.  I  will  try  to  do  so  too, 
and  we  will  think  and  feel  in  communion  this  Christmas. 

"I  have  been  on  a  tour  of  court  campaigning  for  a 
month  at  Williamsburg  and  at  King  George  Court,  and 
though  suffering  much  discomfort  and  catching  cold,  I 
made  enough  to  meet  Christmas  bills,  and  to  gain  breath 
for  another  day  of  labor  and  to  live  for  the  day." 

Although  often  importuned  to  become  again  a  candidate 
for  public  office,  Wise  refused  to  allow  the  use  of  his  name 
in  that  connection.  As  a  friend,  Governor  Cameron  wrote 
of  him :  "  The  very  foundations  of  his  political  faith  had 
been  uprooted,  and  all  that  he  believed  most  sacred  in  the 
fabric  of  our  institutions  had  been  destroyed.  He  made  no 
moan  of  vain  complaining,  applied  himself  diligently  to  the 


THE   GRANT   ADMINISTRATION  391 

practice  of  a  profession  long  ago  laid  aside  for  the  broader 
field  of  statesmanship,  and  in  the  training  of  his  children 
took  a  careful  interest.  But  the  mainspring  of  his  life 
was  broken.  His  mental  and  moral  machinery  could  not  be 
put  in  gear  with  the  new  order  of  things.  ...  4  And,  great 
God  !  sir,'  he  said  to  me  one  day,  '  we  must  now  lick  the 
hand  that  hath  smitten  us,  and  vote  for  Horace  Greeley  as 
a  Democratic  President.  Is  thy  servant  a  dog  that  he 
should  do  this  thing?'  This  last  was  the  hair  that 
broke  the  camel's  back.  And  the  heart  in  him  was  glad 
exceedingly  when  Virginia  refused  to  ratify  what  he 
called  '  the  unholy  and  unnatural  compact,'  but  gave  her 
electoral  vote  to  General  Grant  instead." 

But  if  he  ever  cherished  hopes  of  Grant's  administra 
tion  they  were  destined  later  on  to  be  shattered,  and 
on  January  25,  1875,  he  wrote  to  a  friend :  - 

"  General  Grant  had  an  opportunity,  after  being  freed 
from  Stevens,  Stanton,  Seward,  and  Greeley,  to  have  inau 
gurated  a  patriotic  policy,  which  would  have  poured  balm 
into  the  wounds  of  war  and  have  restored  halcyon  days  of 
peace  to  the  South.  I  had  a  hope  at  one  time  he  would 
allow  the  good  genius  of  the  country  to  be  his  genius, 
and  if  he  had  he  would  have  left  his  office  and  left  this 
world  for  a  better,  happy  and  blessed.  But  he  has  proved 
himself  to  be  but  a  military  martinet  —  has  obeyed  the 
orders  of  that  hydra  monster  Congress,  and  has  'broken 
owners.'  After  carrying  out  a  persecuting  attorney- 
general's  law  and  sending  Sheridan  to  raid  a  legislature, 
I  give  up  all  hope  in  him.  But  Congress  has  lost  its 
prestige  and  power;  he  will  be  turned  neck  and  heels  out 
of  office.  The  owners  of  the  real  wealth  of  the  nation  are 
surely  and  strongly  about  the  work  of  reforming  the  cur 
rency,  and  a  revolution  is  commenced  which  can't  go 
backward,  and  which  will  certainly  build  up  a  new  order 


392  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.   WISE 

for  a  new  era.     This  is  my  only  hope  of  saving  the  re 
public,  its  laws,  and  its  liberty." 

While  entirely  without  sympathy  with  the  Radical 
party  in  his  own  State,  Wise,  on  the  other  hand,  did  not 
approve  of  the  method  of  rehabilitation  devised  by  the 
Conservative  organization  to  bring  Virginia  back  into  the 
Union;  and  he  contributed  a  series  of  letters  to  the  press 
disapproving  the  action  of  what  was  known  as  the  "  Com 
mittee  of  Nine."  The  constitutional  convention  which 
assembled  in  Richmond,  during  the  winter  of  1867-68, 
under  the  auspices  of  the  military  authorities  and  known 
as  the  "Underwood"  Convention  had  been  largely  con 
trolled  by  the  "  carpet-bag "  element  of  politicians  reen- 
forced  by  ignorant  negroes,  and  a  clause  had  been  adopted 
by  which  probably  ninety  per  cent  of  the  adult  white 
population  would  have  been  disfranchised,  rendered  ineli 
gible  to  any  office,  and  incompetent  to  sit  on  a  jury  either 
in  a  civil  or  criminal  case.  Moreover,  it  appeared  probable 
that  with  negro  courts  and  juries,  the  property  of  the 
former  slaveholding  element  would  be  confiscated  under 
the  forms  of  law.  The  presidential  election  of  1868  had 
indicated  very  clearly  that  the  negro  would  be  given  the 
suffrage  by  the  party  in  power,  and  in  the  opinion  of  the 
element  of  Virginia  people  represented  by  the  "  Committee 
of  Nine  "  it  was  the  part  of  wisdom  and  common  sense 
to  accept  "universal  suffrage  and  universal  amnesty," 
rather  than  "  universal  suffrage  and  universal  disfranchise- 
ment."  The  committee  held  numerous  conferences  with 
the  committees  of  the  Senate  at  Washington  (the  bill 
approving  the  Underwood  Constitution  having  passed  the 
House  of  Representatives),  and  with  General  Grant,  who 
in  many  respects  proved  himself  a  generous  friend  of 
Virginia.  Through  their  efforts,  the  test  oath  and  dis 
franchising  clauses  of  the  new  State  constitution  were 


POLITICAL   CONDITIONS   IN   VIRGINIA  393 

defeated,  on  the  condition  that  Virginia  would  ratify  the 
Fourteenth  and  Fifteenth  Amendments  to  the  Constitu 
tion  of  the  United  States.  It  was  a  bitter  pill  for  the 
people  of  Virginia  to  swallow,  their  opinions  in  regard  to 
the  evils  to  be  apprehended  from  negro  suffrage  having 
in  no  wise  changed,  and  nothing  but  what  they  conceived 
to  be  the  necessity  of  looking  the  situation  fully  in  the 
face  prompted  them  to  this  course  of  action.  There  were, 
of  course,  many  irreconcilables,  who  could  not  bring 
themselves  to  approve  it,  or  see  the  virtue  of  such  a  plan. 
General  Jubal  A.  Early  narrowly  escaped  a  personal  diffi 
culty  with  Colonel  John  B.  Baldwin,  a  member  of  the 
committee,  to  whom  he  remarked  that  they  reminded  him 
of  a  game  of  whist,  where  the  players  having  gotten  into 
the  nine  hole  and  being  unable  to  win  the  game  by  honors 
had  to  depend  on  tricks.  Wise  believed  that,  with  a  little 
more  patience  and  a  firm  faith  in  the  obligations  of  a  writ 
ten  constitution  and  in  a  returning  sense  of  justice  and 
patriotism  on  the  part  of  the  party  in  power,  many  of  the 
evils  threatened  could  be  averted.  "If  either  is  forced 
upon  me,"  he  wrote, "  I  am  not  to  blame ;  but  I  will  be 
blamed  by  myself  and  my  heirs  forever  if  I  take  either, 
ly  and  with  my  own  consent,  or  for  and  in  consideration  of 
a  price.  I  would  as  soon  barter  honor  or  charity  for  a 
price.  If  Virginia  is  to  be  forced,  she  will  be  pitied;  but 
if  she  consents,  or  sells  her  honor,  her  oath  will  never  be 
taken  that  she  was  violated.  Let  her  take  death,  I  say, 
rather  than  dishonor.  There  is  no  political  sentimental- 
ism  in  this,  but  common  sense  and  faith  in  the  moral  law ; 
and  some  experience  in  political  events  teaches  me  it  is 
policy  and  expediency  thus  to  abide  in  our  own  continence. 
Gentlemen  say  it  is  to  be  forced  on  us,  and  therefore  they 
consent.  My  reason  for  not  consenting  is,  that  it  is  to  be 
forced  on  us."  And  again  he  wrote:  — 


394  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.    WISE 

"...  But  do  c  prominent  gentlemen '  say  that  our  peo 
ple  can't  bear  to  abide  longer  in  the  present  state  of  things, 
and  can't  wait  for  reasons  and  patriotism  and  a  love  of 
constitutional  liberty,  to  resume  their  reign  ?  I  reply  that 
our  people  are  not  made  of  that  stuff  which  can  be  'fatigued 
into  compliance '  by  an  unmitigated  usurpation  and  tyranny. 
Whoever  can  be  are  already  slaves  fit  for  the  chains  of 
white  slavery  and  negro  domination.  The  people  can  appeal 
to  the  supreme  judicial  tribunals.  But  4  prominent  gentle 
men  '  think,  perhaps,  that  the  judges  of  the  Supreme  Court 
of  the  United  States  cannot  be  relied  on  for  unintimidated 
and  uninfluenced  justice.  To  that  I  can  say  at  least  that 
they  have  not  been  appealed  to,  as  they  ought  to  have  been, 
long  ago,  to  settle  the  questions  arising  under  the  recon 
struction  acts  of  Congress.  In  the  'Reign  of  Terror,' 
under  the  elder  Adams,  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United 
States  was  almost  suspended,  and  the  State  and  Federal 
judiciaries  were  in  a  much  more  fearfully  disturbed  state 
than  they  are  now ;  and  yet  the  spirit  of  justice  frowned 
down  political  disorder  and  brought  the  most  beautiful 
order  out  of  chaos.  The  present  Chief  Justice  Chase 
is  not  the  debauched  Justice  Chase  of  1801.  If  we  can 
do  no  better,  we  can,  I  confidently  believe,  appeal  with 
certainty  at  least  to  our  present  bench,  against  unconsti 
tutional  laws.  The  decisions  of  the  Supreme  Court  thus 
far  have  not  been  of  such  a  character  as  to  make  me  dis 
trust  either  the  wisdom,  or  learning,  or  purity  of  our 
judges.  I  prefer  to  appeal  rather  to  them  to  throw  over 
and  around  us  the  shield  of  the  Constitution,  than  to 
crouch  before  Congress  with  humiliating  consent  to  their 
usurpation.  But  will  '  prominent  gentlemen '  go  the  full 
length  of  saying,  what  is  so  rife  in  the  lips  of  all  who  are 
ready  to  '  consent '  and  to  '  surrender, '  '  there  is  no  longer 
any  Constitution  of  the  United  States  '  ?  I  hope  not.  It  is 


LOYALTY    TO    THE    CONSTITUTION  395 

at  least  our  only  sheet  anchor.  It  is  not  the  fault  of  that 
instrument,  the  wisest  ever  drawn  by  mortal  pen,  that  evil 
days  have  come  upon  this  nation.  The  assaults  of  enemies 
upon  us  are  made  upon  it,  as  heavy  as  upon  us.  The 
blows  at  us  may  excite  no  sympathy  and  no  relenting  of 
our  foes;  but  there  is  a  redeeming  spirit  in  the  love  of 
constitutional  liberty  which  will  defend  the  charter  of  the 
rights  of  all,  and  make  all,  before  long,  feel  the  neces 
sity  of  rallying  to  the  restoration  of  its  supreme  author 
ity,  even  as  if  it  were  our  shield  and  buckler.  Death  has 
stricken  down  the  most  deadly  enemy  to  it,  the  only  man 
who  has  ever  openly  proclaimed  in  the  teeth  of  his  oath  to 
support  it  that  he  was  urgent  to  act  4  outside  of  its  pale  ' 
in  the  passing  of  laws.  Do  '  prominent  gentlemen '  fear 
that  the  majority  of  the  Northern  people  and  their  officials 
are  such  monsters?  If  that  be  true,  then  the  nation  is 
given  over  to  judicial  blindness  and  we  are  all  in  the  black 
ness  of  the  darkness  of  despair !  And  is  that  not  really 
the  rationale  of  the  course  of  proceedings  by  'prominent 
gentlemen'?  Do  they  not  give  up  the  legitimate  and 
constitutional  remedies  ?  Do  they  sufficiently  rely  on  the 
constancy  and  endurance  of  our  people  ?  Do  they  give  up 
judicial  relief  ?  Do  they  give  up  the  Constitution  and  its 
guards  and  guarantees  ?  Have  they  lost  all  trust  and  con 
fidence  in  the  Northern  members  of  the  Union  to  which 
they  are  seeking  to  be  restored?  Then  I  say  they  are 
men  of  despair,  and  are  not  such  as  ought  to  assume  to  de 
fend  their  own  rights,  much  less  the  rights  of  all.  Neither 
desperate  nor  timid  men  can  be  relied  on  to  save  a  people 
in  our  distress.  They  had  better  take  up  their  own  de 
fence  in  their  own  hands,  and  calmly  await  the  effects  of 
not  only  the  memories  of  the  past  but  of  the  hopes  of  the 
future." 

In  regard  to  the  status  of  the  negro  as  affected  by  the 


396  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY    A.    WISE 

results  of  the  war,  Wise  believed  that  as  the  slave  had 
been  freed  and  made  a  citizen  enfranchisement  would 
follow  emancipation ;  or,  in  the  words  of  Senator  Lamar, 
"that  universal  suffrage  being  given  as  the  condition  of 
our  political  life,  the  negro  once  made  a  citizen  cannot  be 
placed  under  any  other  condition." l  In  a  letter  to  a 
friend,  dated  July  25,  1872,  he  wrote :  — 

"  I  was  ever  and  am  now  a  friend  of  the  colored  race. 
They  were  too  peaceable  and  orderly  and  respectful  of  the 
laws  of  God  and  humanity  for  me  now  not  to  be  grateful 
to  them  for  their  conduct  during  the  war.  I  would  not 
enslave  them  or  their  children  again,  if  I  could;  and  I 
could  not  if  I  would.  I,  therefore,  heartily  adopt  as  well 
as  acquiesce  in  the  Fifteenth  Amendment  of  the  Constitu 
tion  of  the  United  States.  I  regret  that  amendment  was 
not  regularly  adopted  by  competent  authority,  free  to  act, 
when  all  the  States  could  be  parties  to  it ;  and  I  wish  now 
to  see  it  adopted  by  the  Union,  in  due  form,  when  all  the 
States  can  act  without  constraint  by  the  force  of  arms.  I 
am  more  than  convinced  now  that  slavery  is  so  great  a 
national  weakness,  if  not  wickedness,  that  it  should  never 
be  tolerated  by  any  people  who  would  themselves  be  free 
and  strong  enough  to  defend  their  right  of  self-government. 
But  I  cannot  consent  to  act  with  any  party  which  sus 
tains  the  Fourteenth  Amendment  or  the  measures  to  carry 
it  out,  or  which  denies  the  sovereign  right  of  State  self- 
government.  This  is  not  the  time  or  place  to  assign 
my  reasons  for  that  faith.  It  is  enough  to  say  that  I  can 
barely  submit  to  it  whilst  enforced  by  superior  power ;  but 
it  shall  never  have  my  free  consent  or  sanction." 

A  new  and  younger  order  of  men  had  assumed  the  con 
trol  of  affairs  in  Virginia  at  this  period,  which  under  all 

1  See  article  on  this  subject  by  Senator  L.  Q.  C.  Lamar,  North  Ameri 
can  Review,  March,  1879. 


THE   FORMATION  OF    WEST    VIRGINIA  397 

the  circumstances  was  probably  for  the  best,  as  the  politi 
cal  upheaval  had  brought  about  absolutely  changed  con 
ditions.  The  derangement  of  the  entire  labor  system  of 
the  State,  the  onerous  burden  of  debts  both  public  and 
private,  the  dismemberment  of  the  Commonwealth  by  the 
formation  of  another  State  within  her  territorial  limits,  and 
complex  questions  too  numerous  to  mention,  demanded  for 
their  solution  not  only  the  exercise  of  ability  and  patriot 
ism  on  the  part  of  those  in  power,  but  required  men  adapted 
to  the  new  era  which  had  supplanted  the  old  regime. 

Virginia  alone  of  the  original  thirteen  States  had  suf 
fered  the  humiliation  of  witnessing  a  large  part  of  her 
territory  torn  from  her  by  a  radical  Congress,  and  the  State 
of  West  Virginia  formed,  which  Wise  in  his  epigrammatic 
way  dubbed  "the  bastard  offspring  of  a  political  rape." 
Thenceforward  the  Alleghanies  and  not  the  Ohio  became 
the  western  boundary  of  the  State.  Although  he  favored 
the  payment  of  the  old  Virginia  bonds,  dollar  for  dollar, 
Wise  was  probably  the  first  to  recommend  the  petitioning 
of  Congress  by  the  two  States  and  their  creditors,  to  as 
sume  the  debt  of  Virginia.  The  Federal  Government  was, 
in  fact,  deeply  in  debt  to  Virginia,  and  in  ceding  the  North 
western  Territory  —  her  splendid  gift  to  the  Union  —  she 
had  stipulated  "that  the  necessary  and  reasonable  expenses 
incurred  by  this  State  in  subduing  any  British  posts  or 
maintaining  forts  or  garrisons  within  and  for  the  defence, 
or  in  acquiring  any  part  of  the  territory  so  ceded  or  relin 
quished,  shall  be  fully  reimbursed  by  the  United  States." 1 
In  his  interesting  history  of  the  debt  controversy  in  Vir 
ginia,  Mr.  Royall  observes  in  this  connection:  "  The  United 
States  Government  accepted  her  grant  upon  the  express 
understanding  that  it  would  repay  her  these  expenses, 

1 1  Virginia  R.  C.,  page  40. 


398  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

which  it  has  never  done.  With  their  accumulated  inter 
est  these  expenses  would  be  a  very  large  sum  now."  The 
justice  of  Wise's  idea  so  commended  itself  to  Mr.  Elaine 
that  he  subsequently  became  its  earnest  advocate. 

But  if,  as  Governor  Cameron  has  written,  Wise's  mental 
machinery  was  out  of  gear  with  the  new  political  condi 
tions  that  existed  in  Virginia,  nevertheless,  no  one  was 
quicker  than  he  to  perceive  the  stern  necessity  for  a  change 
in  the  agricultural  and  industrial  methods  which  had  previ 
ously  prevailed,  and  in  an  address  delivered  at  the  dedica 
tion  of  the  Stonewall  Cemetery  at  Winchester,  in  January, 
1867,  he  said :  — 

"  The  plantation  interest  is  gone,  and  farming,  embrac 
ing  every  variety  of  products  instead  of  a  few  large  staples, 
—  arboriculture,  horticulture,  and  stock-feeding  and  graz 
ing,  and  cultivating  on  a  small  scale  none  but  the  most  im 
proved  lands,  and  these  tilled  to  the  square  inch  by  the 
most  able,  intelligent,  and  skilful  laborers,  hired  at  a  rate 
which  close  farming  only  can  afford,  —  must  be  substituted, 
and  will  change  and  immensely  enrich  the  whole  system 
of  our  agriculture.  This  is  not  a  matter  of  theory,  but  it 
is  a  stubborn  fact,  a  stern  necessity  which  we  must  look 
steadily  in  the  face,  with  the  resolution,  industry,  and  per- 
severence  to  conform  to  the  change.  It  is  repulsive  to 
our  habits,  awkward  and  burdensome  at  first,  and  we  were 
wholly  unprepared  for  it.  But  we  have  no  alternative 
and  must  abide  the  result.  How  abide  it?  Fold  our 
arms  and  cry  out,  '  What  can  we  do  ? '  4  We  have  no 
capital.'  No;  there  is  blessing  beyond  measure  in  this 
change.  Nothing  but  fire  and  blood  could  have  driven 
us  to  it,  and  it  has  shown  what  a  weakness  to  our  people 
African  slavery  was.  Its  weakness  was  so  great  that  it 
self  amounted  to  wickedness.  Nothing  but  negrodom  ever 
could  have  conquered  such  a  people  as  were  the  masters 


ADVICE   TO   YOUNG    VIRGINIANS  399 

of  Virginia  slaves  !  The  faith  of  Jackson  foresaw  this : 
the  war  was  inevitable,  it  was  providential.  Nothing  but 
war  could  have  shocked  us  out  of  this  weakness  into  a  new 
strength  and  vigor.  We  had  to  fight,  and  had  to  surrender, 
too ;  but  it  was  in  the  end  to  be  a  noble,  a  great  and  incal 
culable  victory.  It  was  to  build  anew  thousands  of  cot 
tages,  hamlets,  and  towns  and  cities  where  heretofore  stood 
lone  mansions  of  masters  whose  broad-spread  acres  were 
scourged  by  slaves.  It  was  to  improve  labor  by  a  price 
laid  upon  it ;  it  was  to  bring  an  eye  over  every  inch  of  soil 
and  to  fructify  it  by  the  watchful  interest  and  active  at 
tention  of  its  own  proprietor ;  and  it  was  to  increase  a  white 
population  that  would  be  numerous  and  strong  and  give 
the  land  its  greatest  pride,  a  solid  Caucasian  yeomanry, 
instead  of  being  filled  by  ignorant,  lazy  slaves  of  a  degraded 
race  !  Do  you  say  that  this  will  overdo  farming  ?  I  re 
ply  that  farming,  the  production  of  bread-stuffs,  fruits,  and 
grapes,  can't  be  overdone.  The  more  farming  less  will  labor 
and  living  cost,  and  a  people  can't  be  but  strong  that  can  and 
will  produce  its  own  bread  and  meat  and  clothing  cheap, 
and  the  more  plentiful  the  cheaper.  The  lands  will  pay 
all  the  laborers  worthy  of  their  hire  that  you  can  put  upon 
them,  and  the  old  problem:  'How  little  labor  for  how 
much  land?'  will  be  more  than  solved  by  its  opposing 
problem :  4  How  much  labor  on  how  little  land  ? '  Like 
Agricola  at  Rome,  on  one-tenth  after  division  to  nine  sons, 
you  shall  realize  more  than  was  made  before  on  the  whole. 
Don't  call  out  for  Hercules,  don't  cry  to  the  North  nor  to 
the  money-changers  for  capital  —  a  curse  of  the  times  that 
sells  consciences  and  soils  honor,  and  betrays  comrades  and 
country  —  but  put  your  own  shoulders  to  the  wheel !  Oh ! 
young  men  who  have  fathers  with  naught  now  left  but 
negro-scourged  tobacco  and  wheat  fields,  burthened  with 
old  debts  enough  to  break  the  hearts  of  honest  men  and 


400  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

make  them  bow  in  want  with  sorrow  to  the  grave  —  pull 
off  your  broadcloths  —  bare  your  arms  —  blister  your  hands 
until  blisters  become  callous,  to  plough  and  reap  the  plenty 
which  earnest  labor  will  surely  bring  home  to  pay  debts 
and  provide  comfort  and  maintain  manly  independence ! 
You  have  no  longer  the  host  of  slavery's  drones  to  feed 
and  clothe ;  your  expenses  now  are  comparatively  small. 
Only  be  self-denying,  determined,  and  work !  You  need 
not  fear  that  there  will  be  too  many  of  you  in  the  field. 
But  if  there  are,  those  not  wanting  and  not  willing  there 
can  find  occupations  now  multiplied  and  varied  beyond 
what  plantations  afforded,  to  try  their  fortunes  on.  Min 
ing,  manufacturing,  commerce,  mechanic  arts,  will  now 
open  avenues  for  skill  and  enterprise ;  and  improvements 
in  all  these  will  soon  pay  professional  avocations  higher 
fees  and  wages  than  ever  compensated  them  before. 

"Have  your  fathers  thousands  of  acres  of  land  which 
now  yield  no  income  and  cannot  afford  to  pay  labor  for 
their  cultivation?  Lay  off  the  garden  spots,  scrape  the 
mounds  of  humus  all  around  every  curtilage,  compost  your 
wasted  manures  for  the  little  space  you  can  till,  and  sell 
or  rent  out  or  let  lie  out  every  impoverished  acre.  Aye,  do 
better,  —  advertise  to  select  emigrants  that  you  will  gladly 
give  to  them  one  half  your  superfluous  lands  and  help  them 
build  and  fence  them,  if  they  will  come  and  settle  the  other 
half.  Their  settlement  will  make  the  other  half  far  more 
valuable  than  was  or  is  the  whole.  They  will  give  you 
neighborhood  and  life,  and  bring  to  you  new  lights,  and 
be  your  source  of  most  efficient  labor  and  of  richest  returns. 
Abandon  4  one  ideas ' ;  here  it  is  wheat,  there  it  is  tobacco, 
yonder  corn  and  potatoes,  and  somewhere  else  it  is  brandy 
and  goober-peas.  Go  to  the  fields  and  be  taught  by  your 
own  experience  ;  learn  of  other  crops  and  prepare  your  own 
fertilizers  from  the  forest  leaves  and  pine  tags  and  straw 


ADVICE   TO    YOUNG   VIRGINIANS  401 

and  from  well-fed  cattle  and  pig  pens.  Don't  stand  on  the 
river  bank  like  the  fool  of  Horace  and  wait  for  the  waters 
to  pass  by  before  you  cross  this  Rubicon.  Don't  wait  to 
manure  until  you  can  get  capital  to  buy  guano.  Borrow 
not  at  all,  but  work,  and  you  will  have  wherewith  to 
lend.  The  faith  of  Jackson  saw  this,  that  the  war  would 
put  our  young  men  to  work.  No  more  fair  hands !  No 
more  lazy  morning  hours !  No  more  cigars  and  juleps ! 
No  more  card-parties  and  club-idleness  !  No  more  siren 
retreats  in  summer,  and  city  hells  in  winter ! 

"  The  hard  necessity  which  presses  down  upon  our  people 
may  change  the  Virginia  character  in  some  lamentable 
respects,  but  it  will  also  happily  strengthen  it  in  other 
important  traits.  It  will  dispel  some  weaknesses  which, 
though  grand  and  noble,  impeded  the  power  and  progress 
of  the  State.  Of  the  true  old  Virginian  it  may  well  be 
said :  — 

" '  High-minded  he  was  ever,  and  improvident, 

But  pitiful  and  generous  to  a  fault ; 

Pleasures  he  loved,  but  Honor  was  his  idol.' 

"  To  young  Virginians  I  would  say :  High-minded,  pitiful, 
and  generous  be  as  were  your  fathers ;  honor  must  ever  be 
your  idol ;  but  be  just  before  you  are  generous  ;  and  let  a 
life  of  mere  pleasure  and  all  improvidence  now  cease." 

2D 


CHAPTER   XXII 

HABIT  OP  SWEARING.  LOVE  OF  PARADOX.  TEMPERAMENT 
AND  CHARACTERISTICS.  ESTIMATE  OF  HIM  AS  A  PUBLIC  MAN, 
AND  HIS  POSITION  WITH  REGARD  TO  THE  SLAVERY  QUES 
TION.  VIEWS  ON  THE  CIVIL  WAR.  HIS  ORATORY.  FOND 
NESS  FOR  WHITTLING  AND  GOOD  LIVING.  RELIGIOUS  VIEWS. 
LOVE  OF  THE  COUNTRY.  SICKNESS  AND  DEATH.  TRIBUTES 
OF  JUDGE  CRUMP  AND  OTHERS 

A  WELL-KNOWN  French  author,  M.  Blouet  (Max 
O'Rell),  has  observed  that  the  different  members  of  the 
human  race  are  rarely  pious  and  profane  at  one  and  the  same 
time,  and  that  the  Anglo-Saxon  alone  combines  these  quali 
ties  without  taint  of  hypocrisy.  Like  certain  men  in  his 
day,  Wise  had  the  habit  of  writing  prayers  to  be  read  in 
his  family  at  religious  worship,  and  like  many  others 
he  could  give  utterance  to  violent  expletives  when 
irritated. 

Upon  one  occasion  during  the  war,  while  in  camp  near 
Chaffin's  Bluff,  he  was  seated  in  his  headquarters  tent 
writing  away  diligently  on  a  prayer  to  be  sent  to  his  wife 
for  family  use,  when  his  son  and  a  young  officer,  who  were 
amusing  themselves  at  a  game  of  seven-up,  while  lying 
under  the  fly  of  the  tent,  became  engaged  in  a  dispute  over 
the  cards.  Their  loud  conversation  broke  in  upon  his  re 
ligious  meditations  so  abruptly  that  he  turned  aside  from 
his  labor,  and  in  emphatic  language  called  out :  "  Damn 

402 


HABIT   OF   SWEARING  403 

it,  don't  make  so  much  fuss ;  you  interrupt  all  continuity 
of  thought." 

Wise  had  grown  up  in  the  country  in  Virginia,  at  a 
time  when  swearing  was  by  no  means  an  uncommon 
habit;  and  when  provoked  to  anger  he  did  not  mince 
words.  In  this  connection,  Governor  Cameron  has 
written  of  him  as  follows  :  — 

"A  recent  writer  in  the  Century  dilates  on  General 
Wise's  sometime  lapses  into  profanity  as  though  he  had 
been  inordinately  or  exceptionally  addicted  to  that  habit. 
This  is  not  so ;  and  so  to  represent  him  is  to  caricature  a 
very  great  and  admirable  man,  by  exaggerating  a  mole 
into  a  cancer,  as  if  a  portrait  of  Pitt  should  show  nothing 
but  a  great  wine-bottle,  or  one  of  Grant  only  a  Brob- 
dignagian  cigar.  Undoubtedly,  though,  there  was  a 
picturesqueness  and  muscularity  about  our  governor's 
oaths  which  forbid  their  entire  exclusion  from  a  faithful 
picture." 

A  somewhat  severe  critic,  in  discussing  his  life  and 
career,  has  written  : l  — 

"We  sometimes  find  intellect  of  the  highest  order 
abused  by  a  fondness  for  paradox,  and  a  disposition  to 
make  strong  and  startling  effects  by  sudden  contradic 
tions  of  the  received  opinions  of  the  public,  and  novelties 
of  literary  style.  So  great  is  this  affliction  of  Governor 
Wise  that  the  peculiarity  of  his  conversation  is  never  to 
agree  with  any  opinion  that  is  advanced ;  no  matter  what 
that  opinion  is,  no  matter  how  firmly  fixed  the  common 
place  may  be  in  the  ordinary  judgment  of  men,  he  makes 
a  point  to  go  off  at  a  tangent,  to  dissent  for  the  sake  of 
argument,  and  to  discharge  the  abundant  vivacity  of  his 
mind  in  eloquent  dissertations  at  variance  with  his  audi- 

1  "  The  Life  and  Times  of  Robert  E.  Lee  and  his  Companions  in  Arms," 
by  Edward  A.  Pollard. 


404  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.   WISE 

ence.  His  '  table-talk,'  as  brilliant  as  that  of  Coleridge,  is 
equally  as  rambling,  inconsistent,  and  yet,  after  all,  rather 
showing  a  vivacity  of  intellect  than  an  insincerity  of  con 
viction.  Men  who  can  talk  well  on  all  sides  of  a  question 
are  often  sincere  for  the  moment  in  what  they  profess  to 
believe,  and  persuade  themselves  as  well  as  the  audience 
to  accept  die  novelty  of  their  opinions.  Yet  this  disposi 
tion  of  mind,  entertaining  as  it  may  be,  and  partaking  of  a 
certain  sort  of  genius,  is  an  affliction  —  at  least,  it  borders 
on  a  moral  infirmity ;  it  reduces  the  intellect  that  should 
command  by  its  convictions  to  the  evanescent  triumphs 
of  the  brilliant  disputant.  Such  have  been  the  triumphs 
which  General  Wise  has  achieved,  rather  than  those  of 
the  deliberate  and  trusted  statesman.  His  disordered  and 
inconsistent  political  life  ;  his  strain  after  novelty  in  what 
ever  he  speaks  or  writes ;  his  almost  matchless  command 
of  language,  and  an  eloquence  rich,  affluent,  but  often 
disfigured  by  word-coinage,  and  an  affectation  of  careless 
ness  mixed  up  with  classical  severity,  are  marks  of  an 
afflicted  intellect  that,  with  better  training,  might  have 
conquered  fortune,  and  made  him  a  reputation  that  would 
have  been  a  possession  forever." 

The  above  criticism,  while  unduly  severe,  contains 
within  it  a  certain  amount  of  truth;  for  Wise,  un 
doubtedly,  lacked  symmetry  of  character,  and  was  in 
many  respects  erratic,  and  wanting  in  the  even  balance 
which  we  associate  with  a  really  great  man.  Doubtless, 
he  had  frequent  occasion  to  ponder  the  lines  of  the 
Scotch  poet :  — 

"  Whether  thy  soul 

Soars  fancy's  flights,  beyond  the  pole, 

Or  darkling  grubs  this  earthly  hole 
In  low  pursuit, 

Know,  prudent,  cautious  self-control 
Is  wisdom's  root." 


TEMPERAMENT    AND    CHARACTERISTICS  405 

Yet  in  judging  the  character  of  such  a  man  we  should 
not  fail  to  make  due  allowance  always  for  temperament  in 
attempting  to  arrive  at  any  just  conclusion.  He  was 
largely  a  creature  of  impulse,  and  a  man  whose  acts  found 
their  springs  in  the  promptings  of  his  nature,  rather  than 
in  premeditated  design.  His  temperament  was  a  remark 
ably  mercurial  one,  his  temper  exceptionally  excitable, 
and  his  bump  of  combativeness  developed  in  an  extraor 
dinary  degree.  Probably  a  slender  body,  thin  arms  and 
legs,  a  large  and  over-active  brain,  and  an  imperfect  diges 
tion,  rendered  more  so  by  the  constant  habit  of  chewing 
tobacco,  go  a  long  way  toward  accounting  for  these  traits. 
It  is  manifestly  incorrect,  however,  to  judge  the  acts  of 
such  a  man  by  those  of  the  more  quiet  and  self-contained, 
who,  after  all,  probably  oftentimes,  exercise  a  much  less 
degree  of  self-control ;  and  as  motives  are  to  be  counted 
of  more  importance  than  acts,  so  it  is  by  this  test  that  the 
life  and  character  of  such  an  one  should  be  tried. 

How  shall  we  estimate  his  political  career,  and  what 
place  will  history  accord  to  the  ante-bellum  leaders  of  the 
South  ?  An  author  is  generally  expected  to  give  his  con 
clusions  as  to  the  subject  of  a  biography,  though  to  give 
these  intelligently  is  by  no  means  an  easy  task ;  and  if  we 
have  not  already  conveyed  a  correct  impression,  we  shall 
probably  fail  now.  Though  the  men  of  the  South  of 
Wise's  generation  had,  to  a  certain  extent,  the  problems 
of  modern  society  to  work  out,  in  common  with  the  people 
of  other  lands,  yet  it  is  also  a  fact  that  the  questions  growing 
out  of  the  institutions  of  negro  slavery  overshadowed  in 
importance  all  others  with  which  it  fell  to  their  lot  to  deal. 
That  this  question  should  have  become  the  touchstone, 
by  which  well-nigh  all  others  were  tried,  was  inevitable 
in  the  very  nature  of  things,  however  much  we  may  in 
cline  at  first  glance  to  deplore  the  circumstance.  Slavery 


406  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.   WISE 

had  gradually  become  interwoven  into  the  web  and  woof  of 
the  social  fabric,  and  to  the  complications  arising  out  of 
this  institution  were  added  a  race  problem  the  gravity 
of  which  could  not  well  be  put  aside.  We  shall  fall  into 
an  old  and  very  common  error  if  we  fail  to  keep  these 
points  well  in  view,  for  the  emancipation  of  the  Russian 
serf  furnishes  no  analogy  to  the  problem  growing  out  of 
negro  slavery. 

The  Southern  statesman  of  the  Revolutionary  era  had 
written  the  charts  of  our  liberties,  and  stamped  his  im 
press  upon  the  institutions  of  his  time.  His  place  in 
history  it  is  too  late  to  question  now,  and  we  all  know 
how  he  deplored  slavery,  and  how  we  can  quote  passage 
after  passage  from  his  speeches  and  writings  in  which  he 
holds  up  the  frightful  evils  growing  out  of  that  institution. 
When  we  read  these  and  turn  to  the  lives  of  the  men 
who  flourished  from  1835  to  1860,  either  consciously  or 
unconsciously  we  are  apt  to  institute  a  comparison  be 
tween  them,  a  comparison,  too,  by  no  means  favorable  to 
the  latter.  Our  Revolutionary  sires  lived  under  the  stimu 
lus  of  a  great  crisis,  at  a  time  when  it  was  their  custom 
to  recur  to  first  principles  and  ponder  the  natural  liberties 
of  mankind,  and  when  under  the  influence  of  the  political 
and  social  upheaval  much  of  the  old  order  was  changed. 
Slavery,  though,  did  not  share  this  wreck  of  old  things, 
and  along  with  a  number  of  beautiful  and  highly  moral 
observations  which  were  bequeathed  to  us  in  connection 
with  it.  the  solution  of  the  problem  was  likewise  handed 
down,  —  a  problem  which  increased  in  its  fearful  import 
at  every  decade,  as  the  number  of  slaves  grew  larger  year 
by  year.  The  ante-bellum  Southern  statesman  was  in 
no  wise  responsible  for  the  existence  of  the  institution, 
but  he  found  it  here  and  could  no  more  escape  its  influ 
ences  than  he  could  avoid  breathing  the  air  about  him. 


THE   QUESTION   OF   SLAVERY  407 

His  revolutionary  sire  had  not  spared  him  the  curse,  but 
left  the  question  as  he  found  it,  to  be  met  and  solved  by 
his  children.  Perhaps  it  would  be  very  wrong  to  censure 
the  former  for  not  bringing  about  emancipation.  He  had 
a  great  work  to  do,  and  he  did  it  nobly,  but  that  he  left 
much  undone  is  also  true.  We  know  that  had  he  agi 
tated  this  question  in  1787,  our  country  could  never  have 
been  formed.  It  is  the  merest  commonplace  to  say  that 
a  man  should  be  judged  by  his  circumstances  and  sur 
roundings,  but  to  no  class  of  men  was  this  truth  more 
applicable  than  to  those  of  Wise's  generation.  Judge 
Henry  St.  George  Tucker,  his  law  teacher,  had  written 
in  his  "  Commentaries  "  on  Blackstone,  and  had  taught  in 
his  law  school  at  Winchester:  "Slaves1  were  imposed 
upon  the  people  of  these  States  by  an  unwise  and  cruel 
policy,  which  our  forefathers  in  vain  attempted  to  resist, 
until  the  revolution  enabled  us  to  abolish  the  horrible 
traffic  in  African  slaves,  by  the  earliest  acts  of  the  inde 
pendent  government.  An  immense  slave  population  had 
accumulated  in  the  meantime,  whose  complexion  is  des 
tined  to  preserve  forever  the  distinction  between  the  two 
races  resident  in  the  Southern  country.  To  emancipate 
the  slave  in  the  present  condition  of  the  Southern  States, 
and  either  to  allow  or  to  deny  to  him  equal  privileges, 
would  soon  array  one  race  against  the  other,  and  sow  the 
seeds  of  exterminating  civil  wars.  We  are,  therefore, 
compelled  to  keep  that  wretched  class  of  men  in  servitude, 
from  a  sad  necessity,  unless  some  feasible  plan  can  be 
devised  by  the  statesman  and  philanthropist  for  their 
gradual  emancipation."  The  above  extract  may  be  said 
to  fairly  state  the  views  of  thoughtful  Virginians  at  the 
time  when  Judge  Tucker  wrote,  and  his  teachings  were 

1  Tucker's  "Commentaries,"  Vol.  I.  page  75. 


408  THE  LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

those  imbibed  by  Wise.  That  there  was  a  contrast  in  the 
opinions  expressed  on  this  subject  by  the  Southern  leaders 
(during  the  period  leading  up  to  the  Civil  War)  is  true, 
and  popular  judgment  had,  outwardly  at  least,  changed 
somewhat ;  for  the  South  had  been  placed  in  the  attitude 
of  the  defender  of  slavery.  Extremes  begot  extremes,  and 
it  is  no  difficult  matter  to  trace,  in  the  speeches  and  writ 
ings  of  the  public  men  who  lived  in  the  period  between 
the  year  1835  and  the  Civil  War  in  the  South,  a  growing 
intolerance  and  resentment  of  outside  interference  with 
this  question.  Perhaps  it  was  true  in  some  instances  that 
from  long  familiarity  with  the  institution,  people  had 
grown  so  accustomed  to  it  as  to  lose  sight  of  its  more 
objectionable  and  repulsive  features;  yet  this  cannot  be 
said  to  be  generally  true,  nor  would  it  sufficiently  explain 
the  change  in  the  temper  of  Southern  opinion,  even  if  it 
had  been.  Until  human  nature  shall  have  become  con 
structed  on  a  radically  different  plan  from  that  which  we 
know  at  present,  it  is  not  probable  that  any  class  of  prop 
erty  holders  will  hear  with  patience  insults  and  gibes 
heaped  upon  them,  or  preserve  their  equanimity  while 
they  are  at  the  same  time  told  that  their  possessions  are 
held  in  violation  of  the  law  of  God  and  man.  The  South 
ern  publicist  had  resisted  by  every  lawful  means  the  intro 
duction  of  negroes  into  the  Colonies,  and  Virginia  had 
taken  the  lead  in  the  movement  to  suppress  the  African 
slave-trade,  and  had  witnessed  a  well-nigh  solid  New 
England  delegation  record  their  votes  in  favor  of  its  con 
tinuance.  The  fact  that  the  agitation  was  carried  on  by 
the  people  of  one  section  against  those  of  another,  and 
that,  too,  by  the  same  people  whose  ancestors  had  been  the 
chief  importers  of  negroes,  undoubtedly  added  much  to 
the  bitterness  engendered  by  the  controversy.  Probably 
it  may  be  said  with  truth  that  the  arguments  of  Mr. 


THE   QUESTION   OF   SLAVERY  409 

Henry  George  against  the  justice  and  right  of  holding 
land  as  private  property  have  never  been  fully  answered. 
His  followers  were  already  far  more  numerous  and  respect 
able  than  the  abolitionists  in  1835,  and  it  may  be  that  in 
time  to  come  they  will  constitute  a  majority  of  the  quali 
fied  voters  of  our  land.  If  this  should  ever  be  the  case 
(and  who  is  prepared  to  gainsay  it?),  the  crusade,  against 
private  property  will  be  fiercely  waged  and  full  use  made 
of  the  moral  argument,  but  he  is  indeed  an  irrepressible 
optimist  who  hopes  to  see  the  change  brought  about  in 
peace  and  quietness.  And  if,  perchance,  the  ownership 
of  land  should  cease  in  one  section  of  the  Union  from 
a  purely  economic  reason,  and  the  former  landowners  of 
that  portion  should  paint  in  glaring  colors  the  great 
enormity  and  moral  guilt  of  landholding,  the  shackles  of 
which  their  neighbors  had  not  cast  off,  it  is  not  probable 
that  such  a  course  would  conduce  to  the  continuation 
of  friendship  and  brotherly  love.  Yes,  the  South  had 
grown  defiant ;  it  had  come  in  a  measure  to  defend  that 
which  it  naturally  viewed  as  an  affair  peculiarly  its  own. 
It  was  to  learn  the  truth  of  the  poet's  lines :  — 

"  Arouse  the  tiger  of  Hyrcanian  deserts, 
Strive  with  the  half-starved  lion  for  his  prey ; 
Lesser  the  risk,  than  rouse  the  slumbering  fire 
Of  wild  Fanaticism." 

Probably  no  man  realized  more  keenly  than  Wise  the 
ill  effects  of  slavery,  and  how  it  had  retarded  the  develop 
ment  of  his  State  and  section.  He  had,  along  with  many 
men  of  his  time,  favored  the  African  Colonization  Society, 
and  while  in  Brazil  had  labored  for  the  repression  of  the 
slave-trade  there.  In  the  Virginia  Convention  of  1850-51, 
he  had  told  some  plain,  blunt  truths  in  regard  to  the  work 
ings  of  the  institution;  and  a  man  who  declared  that 


410  THE   LIFE   OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

"  black  slaves  make  white  slaves  "  could  hardly  believe  in 
the  institution  per  se.  Yet  it  must  be  said  that  it  is  by 
no  means  difficult  to  quote  numerous  extracts  from  his 
speeches  and  writings,  from  the  tone  of  which  it  would 
appear  equally,  if  not  more,  natural  to  arrive  at  exactly  the 
opposite  conclusion ;  and  he  engaged  at  times  in  much 
wild  and  extravagant  talk.  His  excitable  temper  and  dis 
position,  when  irritated,  to  run  into  extremes  are  largely  the 
explanation  of  this,  and  are  the  only  sort  of  excuse,  too,  that 
can  be  given  for  his  having  indulged,  just  prior  to  the  war, 
in  some  of  the  silly  attempts  made  among  a  certain  class 
of  Southern  people  to  disparage  Yankee  courage.  Wise 
was  essentially  a  type,  although  an  extreme  one,  of  the 
defiant  attitude  of  the  South  of  1860,  and  bitterly  resented 
outside  interference  with  that  which  he  considered  pecul 
iarly  a  State  and  not  a  national  question,  and  from  inter 
fering  with  which  it  was  the  duty  of  the  North  to  abstain. 
In  common  with  the  best  men  of  his  generation  in  the 
South  he  loved  the  Union  of  the  States,  and  impartial 
history  will  record  of  the  Southern  man  of  1861  that  it  was 
the  growth  of  circumstances  beyond  his  power  to  control 
which  placed  him  in  conflict  with  that  government  to  the 
support  of  which  he  had  contributed  even  more  than  his 
share  of  patriotism.  "As  to  patriotism  in  the  broadest 
sense,  that  is,  belief  in  American  institutions,  there  is  no 
better  patriot  in  the  land  than  the  Southern  man,  and, 
paradoxical  as  it  sounds,  he  was  never  more  intensely 
American  than  when  he  was  trying  to  divide  the  United 
States  that  he  might  have  a  place  where  he  could  work  out 
his  own  interpretation  of  these  ideas  without  interfer 
ence."  l  It  has  been  said  of  the  ante-bellum  Southern 
leader  that  he  never  rose  to  the  national  conception  of  the 

1  "The  Old  South  Still,"  by  Captain  Edward  Field,  Fourth  Artillery 
U.  S.  Army,  United  Service  Magazine  February,  1896. 


HIS    POLITICAL    BELIEFS  411 

Constitution,  and  that  his  talents  were  those  which  tend  to 
conserve  existing  institutions  merely.  It  would  not  be 
difficult  to  point  out  many  fallacies  in  these  statements ; 
but  if  he  failed  to  perceive  what  some  writers  term  the 
growth  of  the  Constitution,  and  still  adhered  to  the  old  land 
marks,  a  disposition  to  "  prove  all  things  "  may  be  as  much 
of  a  virtue  as  an  error,  in  a  government  which  has  been 
described  as  carrying  more  sail  than  anchor.  If  in  the 
eyes  of  his  opponents  he  laid  too  much  stress  upon  the 
letter  of  the  law  and  seemed  at  times  to  forget  that 
the  Constitution,  like  the  Sabbath,  was  made  for  man,  he 
was  but  following  the  teaching  of  his  Revolutionary  sires 
when,  finding  his  rights  disregarded,  he  fell  back  upon 
that  fundamental  organic  law  which  he  had  been  taught 
to  reverence  as  the  sheet  anchor  of  our  safety. 

The  biographer  of  Mr.  Justice  Lamar  gives  the  latter's 
description l  of  a  debate  which  occurred  upon  the  floor  of 
the  Senate  between  Mr.  Seward  of  New  York  and  Mr. 
Hammond  of  South  Carolina.  Seward  had  declared  in 
exultant  tones  that  the  power  had  departed  from  the 
South,  and  "  that  henceforth  the  great  North,  stronger  in 
population  and  in  the  roll  of  sovereign  States,  would  grasp 
the  power  of  government  and  become  responsible  for  its 
administration."  To  these  remarks  the  senator  from 
South  Carolina  made  answer :  — 

"Sir,  what  the  senator  says  is  true.  The  power  has 
passed  from  our  hands  into  yours  ;  but  do  not  forget  it,  it 
cannot  be  forgotten,  it  is  written  upon  the  brightest  pages 
of  history,  that  we,  the  slaveholders  of  the  South,  took  our 
country  in  her  infancy,  and,  after  ruling  her  for  near  sixty 
out  of  the  seventy  years  of  her  existence,  we  return  her  to 
you  without  a  spot  upon  her  honor,  matchless  in  her  splen- 

1  "Life  of  L.  Q.  C.  Lamar,"  by  Edward  Mayes,  pages  89,  90. 


412  THE   LIFE    OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

dor,  incalculable  in  her  power,  the  pride  and  admiration  of 
the  world.  Time  will  show  what  you  will  do  with  her, 
but  no  time  can  dim  our  glory  or  diminish  your  responsi 
bility." 

"  Southern  society  to-day,"  writes  Captain  Field,  "  is  one 
of  the  many  proofs  that  you  cannot  fill  up  without  to  some 
extent  levelling  down.  It  is  so  in  every  department  of 
life.  We  pat  ourselves  on  the  back  when  we  contrast  the 
present  conditions  in  England  and  America  with  what 
existed  one  hundred  and  thirty  years  ago.  Yet  it  is  an 
open  question  whether  those  who  now  rule  in  either  coun 
try  can  be  compared  with  the  governing  class  of  Wolfe  and 
Chatham,  the  men  who  expelled  France  from  India  and 
America  and  made  England  the  arbiter  of  the  world.  In 
Southern  society  forty  years  ago  all  the  juices  of  the  soil 
went  to  produce  one  flower,  but  to-day  we  sadly  miss  that 
flower." 

In  a  speech  delivered  at  Roanoke  College,  Salem,  Vir 
ginia,  on  June  17,  1873,  Wise  gave  utterance  to  the  fol 
lowing  views  in  regard  to  the  war  between  the  States: 
"  The  time  has  not  yet  come  to  view  that  war  calmly  and 
philosophically.  But  this  I  will  venture  to  say  of  it  now : 
that  it  did  what  no  other  human  power  could  have  done, 
—  it  cauterized  and  cured  the  worst  curse  upon  some  of 
the  fairest  portions  of  the  continent,  and  removed  the  only 
incubus  upon  the  development  of  the  southern  part  of  the 
Eastern  Terminus  of  the  Great  Belt.  One  of  nature's 
poems  is  flowing  water,  with  power  in  its  current  to  clarify 
itself  and  purify  its  springs  and  streams.  The  stagnant 
pool  is  thick,  malarious,  and  fetid ;  but  springs  and  streams 
are  usually  clear  and  clean,  and  life-giving  and  life-sustain 
ing.  So  with  the  watershed  of  this  continent ;  it  cleared 
and  cleansed  its  Southern  Geography  of  the  malaria  of 
African  bondage.  That  cause  alone  made  the  Southern 


VIEWS   ON   THE   CIVIL   WAR  413 

States  stagnant.  The  globe  would  not  be  habitable,  if  its 
oceans  were  not  agitated  by  storms,  evaporated  by  the  sun, 
congealed  by  frost,  and  cleansed  by  perpetual  currents. 
And  as  of  the  currents  of  air  and  of  the  waters,  it  may  be 
said,  that  they  often  conflict  with  each  other,  yet  their 
very  cyclones  and  whirlpools  are  made  by  God's  provi 
dence  to  give  motion  and  purification  and  life ;  so  of  our 
Civil  War  it  may  be  said,  I  hope,  in  time  to  come,  that  it 
gave  a  New  Life  to  the  country  and  all  its  parts,  which 
may  atone  for  the  many  precious  lives  which  were  taken 
away  by  its  fire  and  sword.  Nothing  but  intraterritorial 
war  could  have  given  this  New  Life ;  and  it  was  sent  by 
God,  not  only  because  the  Exodus  of  Slavery  had  come, 
but  to  make  the  motion  of  commerce  and  arts  and  migra 
tion  southward.  The  two  Virginias  will  now  be  filled 
with  population  from  abroad  and  from  other  States  at 
home,  and  the  whole  South  will  soon  be  strong  enough 
to  do  a  great  moral  duty  on  their  part."  As  his  purpose 
had  never  been  originally  to  secede  from  the  Union,  so 
he  believed  that  the  destiny  of  his  people  was  wrapped  up 
in  its  future,  and  were  he  alive  he  could  with  truth  repeat 
the  lines  of  his  friend,  James  Barron  Hope :  — 

"  Give  us  back  the  ties  of  Yorktown, 
Perish  all  the  modern  hates ; 
******* 
The  safety  of  the  Union 
Is  the  safety  of  the  States ! " 


He  had  an  abiding  faith  in  the  principles  for  which  the 
South  had  fought  as  he  conceived  them,  and  never  doubted 
that  they  would  in  the  end  triumph,  if  constitutional 
liberty  is  perpetuated  in  America. 

"  A  Lost  Cause  !     If  lost,  it  was  false  ;  if  true,  it  is  not 


414  THE   LIFE    OF    HENKY    A.   WISE 

lost ! "  -  was  the  faith  that  abode  with  him,  and  the 
sentiment  to  which  he  gave  utterance. 

Once  in  alluding  to  his  own  career,  he  said:  "Sir,  I 
never  was  afraid  of  the  people.  If  I  have  any  strength 
before  the  people  and  with  the  people,  I  don't  owe  it  to 
any  ability,  perhaps  to  no  great  merit,  moral  or  intellectual 
of  any  sort,  —  no  great  merit  but  one;  namely,  that  I 
never  in  my  life  was  afraid  to  differ  with  my  constituents, 
and  I  never  was  afraid  to  tell  them  so."  He  belonged  to 
that  class  of  men  who  like  to  go  among  the  plain  people, 
and  who  derive  their  greatest  social  pleasures  from  associa 
tion  with  them,  and  was  himself  a  natural  democrat. 

The  fragments  of  his  speeches  that  have  been  preserved 
render  it  difficult  for  us  to  appreciate  the  effect  they  pro 
duced  at  the  time  of  their  delivery,  and  they  do  not  read 
well.  He  had  remarkable  earnestness  of  manner,  a  ready 
flow  of  words,  and  whatever  his  faults  of  style  he  was 
never  commonplace.  The  people  of  our  own  generation 
are  far  less  susceptible  to  the  influences  of  oratory  than 
those  who  preceded  us,  and  the  ante-bellum  Virginian 
enjoyed  it  to  a  degree  which  we  do  not  witness  in  our 
modern  workaday  world.  Indeed,  oratory  with  him 
corresponded  to  what  the  opera  and  theatre  are  to  the 
modern  resident  of  large  cities.  Wise's  style  was  not  the 
swelling,  majestic  one  of  Webster,  which  Senator  Hoar 
has  termed  a  "  ponderous  Latinity,"  but  rather  "  nervous 
Saxon  "  poured  forth  in  a  torrent-like  flow  of  words,  and 
accompanied  by  great  vehemence  of  manner.  In  the 
moments  of  his  loftiest  flights  we  might  apply  to  him  his 
own  description  of  the  glowing  eloquence  of  Sargent  S. 
Prentiss : 1  — 

"  He  rose  higher  and  higher,  went  up,  and  up,  and  on, 

1  Memoir  of  S.  S.  Prentiss,  edited  by  his  brother,  Vol.  II.  page  61. 


AS   AN   ORATOR  415 

and  on,  and  on,  —  far,  far  away  like  the  flight  of  the  car 
rier-pigeon  !  It  was  the  music  of  sweet  sounds,  and  anon 
it  was  the  roar  of  the  elements.  Figures  bubbled  up  and 
poured  themselves  forth  like  springs  in  a  gushing  fountain, 
which  murmur  and  leap  awhile  amid  mountain  rocks,  then 
run  smooth  and  clear  through  green  and  flowery  valleys, 
until  at  length,  swollen  into  mighty  rivers,  they  roll  on 
ward  to  the  ocean  !  The  human  reeds  bowed  and  waved 
before  his  blasts,  or  lifted  their  heads  and  basked  in 
his  sunshine."  James  Barron  Hope,  the  graceful  poet, 
and  no  ordinary  judge  of  oratory,  thus  describes1  the 
effect  produced  upon  him  by  Wise's  presence  and  elo 
quence  :  — 

"  A  Virginian  '  intus  et  in  cute,'  there  he  stands !  His 
forehead  broad  and  ample ;  his  dark 2  hair  abundant  to 
wildness ;  his  jaw  that  of  a  gladiator,  strong  and  inflexi 
ble  ;  his  lips  thin,  well-cut,  and  resolute ;  his  large,  gener 
ous  mouth  full  of  a  rare  variety  of  expression ;  his  profile 
such  as  you  see  on  antique  medals  of  demigods  and  heroes, 
and  his  face  pale,  but  not  sickly  —  Roman,  —  Roman  of 
that  Rome  wherein  the  leaders  shaped  the  institutions  and 
not  the  institutions  the  leaders. 

"  I  can  see  him  at  this  moment  as  he  held  me  there 
with  his  hazel  eyes,  which  were  now  those  of  a  prophet,  or 
a  seer. 

"I  can  hear  him  as  I  stand,  as  he  held  me  with  his 
voice,  that  had  now  the  melancholy  tone  of  a  pine  swept 
by  the  wind  and  now  the  ring  of  a  trumpet  that  calls  to 
battle ! 

"  In  his  grand  moments  of  inspiration  there  was  an  air 
as  of  eternal  youth  about  his  animated  features  and  sinewy 

1  "  Lecture  on  Virginia,"  by  James  Barren  Hope. 

2  Wise's  hair  in  early  life  was  a  light  flaxen,  but  grew  darker  with 
advancing  years. 


416  THE   LIFE   OF   HENRY   A.  WISE 

frame,  as  though  a  ray  from  another  world  had  fallen  on 
him,  at  once  the  light  and  forecast  of  immortality ! 

"  He  was  indeed  an  orator !  Not  only  an  orator,  but  a 
statesman,  wise,  able,  and  sagacious !  Not  only  a  states 
man,  but  a  soldier,  tried,  true,  and  faithful,  and  as  the 
years  roll  on  his  form  now  heroic  will  become  colossal  in 
its  proportions  worthy  of  a  statue  to  be  cleft  out  as  was 
the  statue  of  the  Lion  of  Lucerne." 

Of  his  conversational  powers  a  friend  has  written:  "Even 
in  the  course  of  casual  conversation  the  richness  and  copi 
ousness  of  his  vocabulary  excited  wonder  and  admiration. 
I  heard  him  once  upon  a  railroad  train  telling  to  some 
chance  travelling  companion  the  story  of  the  sinking  of 
the  Cumberland  by  the  Merrimac,  and  it  was  as  if  listening 
to  the  declamation  of  a  page  from  Homer,  so  sonorously 
and  in  such  poetic  phrase  fell  the  unpremeditated  narra 
tive.  The  closing  words  haunt  me  yet :  l  And  as  she  sank, 
sir,  and  the  waves  closed  over  the  living  and  the  dead,  the 
sound  of  the  last  gun  furnished  a  requiem  for  the  brave ; 
and  it  came  muffled,  dank,  and  despairing,  like  a  voice  from 
the  caverns  of  the  deep/  " 

The  last  years  of  Wise's  life  were  spent  in  Richmond, 
at  the  house  formerly  known  as  the  Freeland  homestead, 
which  stood  upon  the  corner  of  Fifth  and  Gary  streets.  To 
this  he  removed  about  the  year  1873  and  continued  to  re 
side  there  up  to  the  time  of  his  death.  Richmond  at  that 
date  had  not  become  so  closely  built  up  as  at  present,  and 
there  were  still  left  a  few  old-fashioned  houses  with  enclos 
ures  about  them  large  enough  to  contain  a  garden  and 
flowers.  The  Freeland  house  was  one  of  these,  and  he  was 
able,  on  a  limited  scale,  to  indulge  his  taste  for  gardening, 
of  which  he  was  extremely  fond,  and  it  was  his  habit  in 
the  spring  of  the  year  to  work  with  his  hoe  before 
breakfast,  after  his  return  from  market,  whither  he  re- 


RECREATIONS  AND  PLEASURES          417 

paired  at  an  early  hour.  At  that  place  he  knew  every 
huckster  and  driver  of  a  market  cart ;  as  well  as  all  the 
boys  in  his  neighborhood,  many  of  whom  still  remember 
a  spare  old  man,  with  piercing  eyes,  and  beaver  tilted  back 
upon  his  head.  He  probably  found  his  greatest  recreation, 
however,  in  carving  canes  and  jackstraws  with  his  pen 
knife,  in  which  he  displayed  much  skill.  He  would  sit  be 
fore  his  fireplace  cutting  alligators,  Turks'  heads,  Punches 
and  Judies,  and  the  like,  on  the  head  of  a  stick  to  be  pre 
sented  to  some  friend ;  or  else  making  a  set  of  jackstraws 
for  the  children,  or  a  salad  spoon  and  fork ;  and  whenever 
he  went  to  Virginia  springs  he  would  be  out  on  the  moun 
tain  sides  gathering  sticks  for  these  purposes.  He  also 
found  great  pleasure  in  carpentering,  for  which  he  had 
a  decided  talent;  and  on  his  death-bed  amused  himself 
cutting  out  and  rigging  up  the  model  of  a  two-masted 
schooner. 

Like  most  old-fashioned  Virginians  hailing  from  the  salt 
water  country,  he  liked  good  eating,  and  particularly  those 
things  furnished  by  the  Chesapeake.  He  enjoyed  a  barrel 
of  oysters  from  his  native  peninsula,  or  a  dozen  diamond 
backs  which  he  would  delight  in  preparing  according  to 
the  method  known  in  his  section  of  the  State.  His  views 
on  this  point,  which  cooks  everywhere  would  do  well  to 
follow,  were  embraced  in  a  saying  attributed  to  Judge 
,  a  noted  character  and  oddity  living  on  the  east 
ern  shore. 

"  Well,  sir,  it's  all  very  well  to  talk  about  fixin'  up  your 
tarrapin  with  spices  an'  things ;  but  give  me  my  tarrapin 
straight.  You  first  bile  him  till  the  under  shell  comes  off 
easy ;  then  you  take  out  the  gall-sac,  an'  butter  him,  an' 
put  pepper  an'  salt  on  him,  an'  then  you  have  a  tarrapin 
that  is  a  tarrapin."  Although  by  no  means  a  gourmand, 
Wise  liked  salads  and  other  dishes  which  he  would  com- 

2E 


418  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY    A.    WISE 

pound  with  great  care.  One  of  his  special  weaknesses  was 
for  slaw.  During  the  war  he  was  at  one  time  critically  ill 
with  pneumonia  and  placed  under  the  strictest  regimen  by 
his  physician.  He  awoke  one  night  about  the  hour  of 
twelve  and  a  craving  for  slaw  possessed  him  to  such  an 
extent  that  he  called  his  man  servant,  a  venerable  old 
negro  named  Harry,  and  told  him  to  procure  a  fine  head 
of  cabbage  without  delay.  The  expression  on  old  Harry's 
face  at  the  announcement  of  this  order  was  a  study,  and  he 
began  to  protest,  but  the  order  was  repeated  in  a  peremp 
tory  manner,  and  the  cabbage  brought.  When  a  few  hours 
later  on  the  doctor  appeared  on  the  scene,  an  empty  bowl 
and  the  remains  of  a  few  leaves  and  stalk  on  the  table  sug 
gested  what  had  happened,  and  the  physician  gave  it  as  his 
opinion  that  he  would  be  a  dead  man  —  but  he  lived  to  tell 
the  tale. 

During  his  last  years  Wise  wrote  and  published  a  work 
entitled :  "  Seven  Decades  of  the  Union,"  illustrated  by  a 
memoir  of  John  Tyler,  being  a  treatment  of  American  his 
tory  from  1790  down  to  the  period  of  the  Civil  War. 
Although  not  prepared  perhaps  with  as  great  a  degree  of 
painstaking  as  it  might  have  been,  it  is  nevertheless  a 
most  interesting  and  valuable  addition  to  the  political  and 
historical  literature  of  the  country,  particularly  as  regards 
the  period  of  Mr.  Tyler's  administration. 

During  these  closing  years  he  served  as  a  member  of  the 
Virginia-Maryland  Boundary  Line  Commission,  appointed 
for  the  purpose  of  ascertaining  the  correct  line  across  the 
Chesapeake  between  the  two  States,  a  subject  with  which 
he  was  very  familiar,  but  with  this  exception  he  never 
held  or  sought  a  public  position  of  any  kind. 

To  a  friend  —  the  Rev.  Peyton  Harrison,  who  had  written 
to  him  on  the  subject  of  religion — he  replied  in  the  follow 
ing  letter :  — 


RELIGIOUS   VIEWS  419 

"  On  my  return  last  Friday  from  an  absence  of  several 
weeks,  I  found  your  kind  and  very  acceptable  letter  of 
the  29th  ult. 

"  In  reply  I  have  to  say,  that  more  than  fifty  years  ago 
and  ever  since,  I  had  and  have  still  the  most  anxious  as 
well  as  serious  thoughts  about  the  salvation  of  my  soul. 
Your  question  about  4  a  convenient  season '  is  too  vague : 
it  means  little  but  a  common  error,  which  I  can't  descant 
upon  now.  Repentance  has  always  been  playing  false  to 
me,  and  Faith  in  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  has  ever  abided 
and  now  still  more  than  ever  abides  with  me.  I  put  my 
whole  trust  in  Him  who  is  4  All  in  All.'  I  know  that  my 
Redeemer  liveth.  I  delay  not  and  await  His  time.  If  I 
fail  or  fall,  it  will  be  on  my  knees  clinging  to  Him  on  the 
cross.  But  this  to  you  is  all  liable  to  great  misapprehen 
sion,  and  I  must  stop  writing  and  you  must  call,  going  or 
coming  from  Prince  Edward ;  come  and  spend  the  night 
with  me  in  Richmond  —  my  wife  will  rejoice  to  see  you 
on  such  a  mission  —  and  then  we  can  talk  '  face  to  face.' 
I  regret  you  missed  me  both  times  in  Baltimore." 

In  a  letter  to  a  friend  who  had  lost  a  much-beloved 
daughter,  he  wrote  :  "  You  will  henceforth  eagerly  seek  to 
go  to  your  Father  in  Heaven,  because  He  has  now  in  His 
bosom  your  4  lamb.'  The  '  Lamb  of  God '  is  the  Shepherd 
of  the  'lambs'  of  earthly  love.  Oh!  how  satisfying  as 
well  as  consoling  is  that  blessed  assurance  of  Christian 
Faith  and  Hope !  And  there  is  something  else  in  this 
assurance  which  is  now  a  reality :  we  do  not  lose  the  pre 
cious  ones  who  go  before  us  even  whilst  we  abide  in  the  world 
of  sin  and  suffering.  Not  for  all  the  dross  of  earth  would 
I,  my  dear  companion  in  grief,  exchange  the  holy  bliss  and 
blessed  comfort  of  communing  with  their  spirits  whilst  I 
am  still  waiting  for  Death,  amidst  tears  and  trials  of  this 
life.  Ah !  in  one  sense  of  little  import  they  are  gone  — 


420  THE   LIFE    OF    HENRY   A.  WISE 

but  gone  from  sin  and  trouble  and  suffering  and  tempta 
tion.  They  are  gone  to  a  Heavenly  Home  of  Rest  and 
Truth  and  Eternal  Bliss.  They  still  speak  to  me,  without 
a  pang  or  shadow  of  passion.  They  are  ever  smiling  upon 
us  and  beckoning  us  away  from  earth  to  join  them  in 
realms  of  joy  and  gladness." 

Life  in  Richmond,  or  in  fact  in  any  city,  was  uncon 
genial  to  him,  and  during  the  last  year  of  his  life  he  was 
contemplating  the  purchase  of  a  home  in  his  native  county, 
where  he  hoped  to  spend  the  brief  remainder  of  his  days, 
and  to  hear  once  more  the  soughing  of  its  pines  and 
the  beating  of  its  surf  against  the  shore,  where  he  could 
inhale  the  salt  breezes  which  he  loved.  It  was  probably 
during  a  period  of  these  reflections  that  he  copied  the 
lines  of  Praed  found  among  his  papers :  — 

"  Scene  of  my  best  and  brightest  years ! 
Scene  of  my  childhood's  joys  and  fears ! 
Again  I  gaze  on  thee  at  last ; 
And  dreams  of  the  forgotten  past, 
Robed  in  the  visionary  hues 
That  memory  flings  o'er  all  she  views, 
Come  fleeting  o'er  me !  —  1  could  look 
Unwearied  on  this  babbling  brook, 
And  lie  beneath  this  aged  oak, 
And  listen  to  its  ravens  croak, 
And  bound  upon  my  native  plain, 
Till  fancy  made  me  boy  again ! 
I  could  forget  the  pain  and  strife 
Of  manhood's  dark,  deceitful  life ; 
I  could  forget  the  ceaseless  toil, 
The  hum  of  cities  and  the  coil 
That  interest  flings  upon  our  hearts, 
As  candor's  faded  glow  departs ; 
I  could  forget  whatever  care 
It  has  been  mine  to  see  or  share, 
And  be  as  playful  and  as  wild 
As  when,  a  dear  and  wayward  child, 


LOVE  FOR  THE   COUNTRY  421 

I  dwelt  upon  the  fairy  spot, 
All  reckless  of  a  bitterer  lot. 
Then  glee  was  high,  and  on  my  tongue 
The  happy  laugh  of  folly  hung, 
And  innocence  looked  bright  on  youth, 
And  all  was  bliss  and  all  was  truth. 
There  is  no  change  upon  the  scene, 
My  native  plain  is  gayly  green, 
Yon  oak  still  braves  the  wintry  air, 
The  raven  is  not  silent  there ; 
Beneath  my  foot  the  simple  rill 
Flows  on  in  noisy  wildness  still. 
Nature  hath  suffered  no  decay; 
Her  lordly  children  !  where  are  they  ? 
Friends  of  my  pure  and  sinless  age, 
The  good,  the  jocund,  and  the  sage; 
Gone  is  the  light  your  kindness  shed, 
In  silence  have  ye  changed  or  fled ; 
Ye  and  your  dwellings  !  —  yet  I  hear 
Your  well-known  voices  in  mine  ear, 
And  see  your  faces  beaming  round, 
Like  magic  shades  on  haunted  ground. 
Hark !  as  they  murmur  down  the  dell, 
A  lingering  tale  those  voices  tell ; 
And  while  they  flit  in  vacant  air, 
A  beauteous  smile  those  faces  wear. 
Alas !  I  turn  my  dreaming  eyes ; 
The  lovely  vision  fades  and  flies ; 

The  tale  is  done 

The  smile  is  gone 
I  am  a  stranger,  and  alone." 

The  year  1875  had  been  a  successful  one  for  Wise  in 
the  practice  of  his  profession,  and  he  felt  much  encouraged 
from  a  business  standpoint,  but  his  poor  health  and  attacks 
of  sickness  indicated  that  the  end  was  not  far  off.  On 
January  7, 1876,  he  wrote  from  Richmond,  to  his  daughter, 
Mrs.  Garnett:  — 


422  THE   LIFE   OP   HENRY   A.  WISE 

"  MY  DEAR  CHILD  :  —  Yours  of  the  31st  was  what  I  ex 
pected,  and  have  always  regularly  and  punctually  received 
from  you,  a  repetition  of  your  affectionate  reverence  and 
dutiful  attention.  It  hasn't  been  neglected.  On  the  con 
trary,  it  touched  me  now  more  than  ever ;  now  that  I 
know  death  has  grappled  my  windpipe,  and  I  am  weak 
ening  every  day  under  the  fatal  grasp.  I  am  no  bet 
ter  in  fact,  but  stronger  than  when  you  were  here.  I 
suffer  exceedingly  from  my  cough,  and  worse  from  its 
effects  on  my  enlarged  hernia.  ...  I  wish  I  had  recol 
lected  your  mother's  birthday,  but  what  matters  it  ?  She 
is  a  saint,  or  there  are  none  around  the  throne  of  God. 
Oh !  Mary,  how  vividly  now  all  the  time  the  past  comes 
up  to  me  and  over  me,  its  reminiscences  constituting  my 
whole  religion.  The  sweet  memory  of  your  mother  more 
than  anything  else  assures  me  that  I  am  not  to  be  cast 
out.  She  and  Obie l  are  above,  and  waiting  on  my  case 
and  waiting  for  me." 

Although  his  health  improved  for  a  short  while,  he  was 
confined  to  the  house  on  the  1st  of  April,  where  he  lin 
gered  until  the  12th  of  September,  the  time  of  his  dissolu 
tion.  His  mind  remained  bright  and  clear  to  the  last,  and 
a  short  while  before  his  death  he  was  talking  to  his  son, 
and  giving  him  advice  concerning  the  rearing  of  his  chil 
dren.  "  Take  hold,  John,"  he  said,  "  of  the  biggest  knots 
in  life,  and  try  to  untie  them  —  try  to  be  worthy  of  man's 
highest  estate  —  have  high,  noble,  manly  honor.  There  is 
but  one  true  test  of  anything,  and  that  is,  is  it  right?  If 
it  isn't,  turn  right  away  from  it." 

His  funeral  services  were  conducted  from  St.  James 
Protestant  Episcopal  Church,  by  his  friend,  the  Rev. 
Joshua  Peterkin,  and  appropriate  honors  paid  his  memory 

1  His  son,  O.  Jennings  Wise. 


TRIBUTES    OF    HIS    FRIENDS  423 

by  his  comrades  in  the  Confederate  Army,  the  local  mili 
tia,  and  various  civic  organizations.  At  a  meeting  of  the 
bar  of  the  city,  his  lifelong  friend,  Judge  W.  W.  Crump, 
after  dwelling  upon  his  career  in  public  life,  as  a  lawyer 
and  soldier,  declared  that  he  had  never  known  a  man  more 
public  spirited  than  the  deceased.  "There  was  never  a 
time  when  he  was  not  ready  to  stem  any  tide  of  corruption 
and  wrong.  He  was,  in  truth,  a  knight-errant,  armed  cap- 
a-pie  for  every  fray,  and  especially  against  every  wrong, 
oppression,  and  corruption  that  had  existed  in  his  day.  In 
his  whole  life  he  had  never  been  found  heading  majorities, 
or  running  with  crowds,  that  easy  way  of  gaining  popular 
ity,  but  he  was  ever  seen  fighting  for  the  right  against 
wrong.  No  matter  who  differed  with  him,  there  was  no 
man  who  could  not  lay  a  wreath  upon  his  grave  and  say, 
4  Here  lies  a  true,  disinterested  patriot.'  Nor  was  he 
wanting  in  the  gentler  traits.  A  warmer  heart  than  his 
never  beat.  To  the  weak,  the  young,  the  helpless,  the 
downtrodden,  he  was  especially  a  friend ;  and  they  would 
drop  as  sincere  tears  upon  his  grave  as  ever  fell." 

Another  admirer  has  recently  written:  "To  me  in 
memory  he  reappears  a  knightly  figure  of  a  heroic  age, 
single-hearted,  lofty-minded,  honest,  generous,  brave,  —  a 
noble  product  of  the  loins  of  the  Commonwealth  he  loved 
so  well.  Virginia's  epitaph  upon  his  tomb  might  fitly  be  : 
4  To  grateful  mother,  never  truer  son.'  " 


INDEX 


Aberdeen  Act,  the,  110. 

Abbott,  Capt.,  361. 

Abolition  petitions,  44,  47,  51-54;  de 
bates  in  the  Senate  over,  47,  57-62. 

Accomack,  1,  3,  5,  10, 15,  26,  31,  36,  38, 
41,  102,  103,  104,  107,  119,  121,  122, 
156,  160,  203,  206,  232,  262;  Court- 
House,  6. 

Adams,  John  Quincy,  42, 44,  45 ;  in  the 
debates  on  abolition  petitions,  54-61 ; 
attacks  Wise  on  account  of  the 
Graves-Cilley  duel,  58,  86;  — Rev. 
Nehemiah,  160;  letters  to,  from 
Wise,  161. 

Alexander,  Hon.  Mark,  371. 

Allen,  Judge  John  J.,  248. 

Amelia  Court-House,  361,  365. 

American  Anti-slavery  Society,  the, 
formed,  45. 

American  party,  the,  166, 167, 169, 174- 
178 ;  Mr.  Flournoy  the  candidate  of, 
170-203;  "Basis  of  Principles"  of, 
182,  183;  Anti-Romanist  attitude 
of,  165-169,  182-186,  192-195. 

"  Amnesty  Act,"  the,  377. 

Anderson,  Frank  P.,  286,  310,  311,  362; 

—  John  T.,  of  Botetourt,  147. 
Anderson's  Corps,  5. 
Andrew,  Gov.  John  A.,  259. 
Anti-duelling  Act,  the,  86. 
Anti-Romanist  feeling  in  the  American 

party,  165, 166, 169, 176, 177, 182-186 ; 

letter  of  Bishop  McGill,   185,  186; 

Wise's  speech  on  the,  192-195. 
Appomattox,  181,  338,  339, 342, 345, 346, 

351,  360,  367,  371 ;  Court-House,  354. 
Archer,  Col.  Fletcher  H.,  340,  342,  344 ; 

—  William  S.,  on  the  discussion  of 
Slavery,  51 ;  demands  confirmation 
of  Wise  as  minister  to  Brazil,  104. 

Armistead,  Capt.,  318. 


Army  of  Northern  Virginia,  the,  5, 

319,  354,  366. 

Arnold,  of  Tennessee,  59. 
Ashby,  Richard,  276 ;  —  Turner,  276. 
Aurora  Borealis,  a  war-time,  330-335. 
Austin,  Capt.,  289. 
"  Awkward  Squad,"  the,  43. 
Aylett,  Patrick  Henry,  204. 

Bagwell,  Mrs.,  the  case  of,  121,  122. 

Baldwin,  John  B.,  131,  269,  274,  278- 
280,  393. 

Banks  of  the  United  States,  43 ;  Jack 
son's  hostility  to,  43,  88 ;  Tyler  ve 
toes  the  charter  of,  92,  94. 

Banks,  Nathaniel  P.,  229. 

Barbour,  Alfred,  276 ;  —  James,  of  Cul- 
pepper,  147, 148,  269 ;  —John  S.,  276 ; 
—  Philip  P.,  35,  140. 

Barren,  Commodore  James,  316;  urges 
adoption  of  an  ironclad,  65. 

Beale,  James  M.  H.,  of  Mason,  179, 
181;  — R.  L.  T.,  of  Westmoreland, 
147. 

Beauregard,  in  command  of  the  de 
fence  of  the  S.  C.  coast,  324,  326, 
337-339;  in  defence  of  Petersburg, 
345,  349,  352,  354,  355. 

Beecher,  Rev.  Henry  Ward,  229. 

Benjamin,  Hon.  Judah  P.,  Secretary 
of  War,  in  the  Confederate  States, 
298,  306,  308,  313,  314. 

Benton,  Thomas  Hart,  69,  70,  99. 

Berkeley,  Sir  William,  2,  4. 

Berrien,  Senator,  from  Georgia,  90, 
286. 

Elaine,  James  G.,  173,  397. 

Blouet,  M.  (Max  O'  Rell),  402. 

Bocock,  Willis  P.,  171. 

Boiling,  Philip  A.,  of  Buckingham,  313. 

Booker,  George,  of  Hampton,  208,  263. 


425 


426 


INDEX 


Botts,  John  Minor,  of  Henrico,  91,  147. 

Bouldin,  Judge,  of  Virginia,  expires 
on  the  floor  of  the  House,  44. 

Bowman's  Folly,  6,  7,  10,  13. 

Brandywine,  11. 

Bragg,  Gen.,  337,  338. 

Braxton,  Carter  M.,  31,  339  note. 

Brazil,  108, 109, 118 ;  the  Court  of,  109, 
110,  115,  119;  the  Emperor  of,  108, 
119;  the  slave-trade  in,  109-116. 

Brockenbrough,  John  W.,  22. 

Brooke,  Lieut.  John  M.,  317. 

Brooks,  Gen.,  348-350. 

Brown,  John,  his  part  in  the  Potta- 
watomie  massacre,  240 ;  his  career  in 
Kansas,  240,  242 ;  the  number  of  his 
followers,  243;  the  raid  of,  243,  244; 
arrest  and  trial  of,  245,  250;  mes 
sage  of  Gov.  Wise  to  the  legislature 
concerning,  251-254;  report  of  the 
legislative  committee  on,  256-258; 
Northern  views  of,  259. 

Brownson's  Quarterly  Review,  184. 

Bruce,  James  C.,  181,  269. 

Buchanan,  119,  206,  208,  210. 

Burlingarne,  Hon.  Anson,  229. 

Burnside,  Maj.  Ambrose  E.,  309,  315, 
352;  expedition,  the,  307,  309,  315. 

Burton,  Gen.  Henry  S.,  374. 

Butler,  Gen.  Benjamin  F.,  337-342,  375. 

Bynum,  of  North  Carolina,  associated 
with  Jones  as  second  in  the  Graves- 
Cilley  duel,  82,  83,  85. 

Cabell,  Joseph  C.,  137. 

Calhoun,  John  C.,  37,  42,  66;  his  nom 
ination  as  Secretary  of  State,  96-100. 

Calvert,  Gov.,  3. 

Cambreleng,  C.  C.,  42. 

Campbell,  Alexander,  130,  131. 

Cameron,  Gov.  William,  a  description 
of  Henry  A.  Wise  about  1855  by,  173 ; 
later  comments  by,  390. 

Campbell,  Lewis  D.,  229. 

Camp-meeting,  anecdotes  of,  122-124. 

Canby,  Gen.,  374,  381. 

Caperton,  Allen  T.,  of  Monroe,  147. 

Carlisle,  John  S.,  of  Barbour,  147. 

Carnifax  Ferry,  the  battle  of,  288-299. 

Carroll,  Charles,  193. 

Carter,  Hill,  of  Shirley,  102. 

Cary,  Capt.  Milton,  277. 


Catapulta,  the,  said  to  be  the  first  iron 
clad,  63-65. 

Ceredo  colony,  the,  211,  213. 

Chaffin's  Bluff,  Gen.  Wise  stationed 
at,  318,  319,  322,  323,  328,  402. 

Chahoon,  George,  contests  the  mayor- 
ship  of  Kichmond,  Va.,  with  Elly- 
son,  381,  382. 

Chapman,  Gen.,  295;  — Conrad  W., 
328;— John  G.,  328. 

Chase,  Hon.  Salmon  P.,  229,  394. 

Chesconnessex,  the,  4,  5,  9,  14,  16,  17. 

Chilton,  Samuel,  one  of  John  Brown's 
counsel,  248,  252. 

Chincoteague  Island,  122. 

Choate,  Rufus,  42. 

Christian,  Judge  John  B.,  98,  99. 

Cilley,  Jonathan,  duel  between  Graves 
and,  58,  80-86. 

Clarkson,  Lieut.-Col.  John,  287. 

Clay,  Cassius  M.,  229;  Henry,  42,  87, 
91-94,  102,  104;  his  connection  with 
the  Graves-Cilley  duel,  82, 86 ;  politi 
cal  avowals,  88-90. 

Clifton,  14,  22. 

Coke,  Richard,  36,  39,  65;  the  duel 
between  Mr.  Wise  and,  40,  41. 

Cold  Harbor,  the  battle  of,  341,  345, 
351,  355. 

Coles,  Capt.,  311,  312. 

Colonization  Society,  African,  46; 
favored  by  Mr.  Wise,  407 ;  Tennessee, 
Wise  the  secretary  of,  29 ;  Virginia, 
156 ;  addressed  by  Mr.  Wise,  156. 

Colquitt's  Brigade,  327. 

Colston,  Gen.  R.  E.,  346,  348. 

"  Committee  of  Nine,"  the,  392. 

Compromise,  the  Missouri,  89, 232,  234. 

Conference,  Peace,  the,  269,  272. 

Conrad,  Robert  Y.,  22,  269,  278. 

Constitution,  of  the  United  States, 
the,  232,  239;  Lecompton,  in  Kan 
sas,  the,  236,  264;  Underwood,  in 
Virginia,  the,  392. 

Convention,  Virginia  Constitutional, 
of  1829,  131-134;  of  1831,  135;  of 
1850,  129,  131,  143,  146-151,  155,  409 ; 
conditions  leading  up  to,  134-146; 
State,  of  1861,  269,  270-274 ;  Virginia 
Democratic,  of  1852,  163;  of  1854, 
169 ;  of  1860,  263 ;  National,  of  1852, 
164 ;  of  1856,  208 ;  of  1860,  264 ;  Nash- 


INDEX 


427 


ville,  of  1850,  162,  163 ;  Underwood, 

in   1867-68,   392;    Winchester,    the, 

of    the    American    party,   179,   181, 

202. 

Cooke,  John  R.,  22,  131. 
Cooper,  Gen.,  284,  290. 
Copeland,  a  follower  of  John  Brown, 

248,  255. 
Coppie,  a  follower  of  John  Brown,  245, 

248,  250,  254,  255. 
"  Corporal's  guard,"  the,  93,  102. 
Corwin,  Thomas,  42. 
Council,  Lieut.-Col.  J.  C.,  340,  351. 
Cox,  Gen.  Jacob  D.,  287-296,  298. 
Crater,  the  battle  of  the,  358. 
Crawford's    statue    of    Washington, 

unveiled  with  speech  by  Gov.  Wise, 

260,  261. 

Critcher,  Judge  John,  280. 
Crittendeu,  John  J.,  associated  with 

Wise  in  the  Graves-Cilley  duel,  82. 
Crockett,  Thomas,  125. 
Croghan,  Lieut.-Col.,  292. 
Cropper,   Gen.  John,  6,  8,  10-13,  17; 

—  Sarah  Corbin  (Sallie) ,  mother  of 

Henry  A.  Wise,  6,  8,  9,  10. 
Crosby,  Rev.  John,  his  description  of 

Mr.  Flournoy,  180. 
Crozet,  Claudius,  137. 
Cushing,  Caleb,  76,  93,  95,  97,  101. 
Custer,  Gen.,  his  meeting  with  Wise 

at  Appomattox,  369,  370. 
Custis,  John,  17. 

Dahlgren,  the  burning  of  "  Eastwood  " 
by,  331-335. 

Dalby,  James  B.,  38. 

Dale,  Sir  Thomas,  2. 

Daniel,  Judge  William,  248. 

Davis,  Col.  J.  Lucius,  286,  300;  — Jef 
ferson,  President  of  the  Confederate 
States,  282,  303,  322,  337,  372,  375; 
—John,  69;  —  Matthew  L.,  80. 

Dawson,  of  Georgia,  57. 

Dearing,  Gen.  James,  345-347. 

De  Villiers,  Col.,  289. 

District  of  Columbia,  slavery  in,  44- 
62,  89. 

Doddridge,  Philip,  131. 

Dogwood  Gap,  293,  295,  297,  300. 

Dom  Pedro  II.,  108. 

Douglas,  Beverly  B.,  of  King  William, 


147 ;  —  Frederick,  244 ;  —  Stephen, 
173,  264;  — W.  R.  C.,  170. 

Dromgoole,  35,  55,  131. 

Drummondtown,  9,  10,  31,  71. 

Duel,  between  Burr  and  Hamilton,  80 ; 
Graves  and  Cilley,  58,  80-86. 

Duke,  Col.  R.  T.  W.,  318. 

Duncan,  Mr.,  of  Illinois,  associated  with 
Jones  in  the  Graves-Cilley  duel,  82- 
85 ;  —  Col.  R.  P.,  348, 362 ;  —  Thomas, 
Wise's  first  law  partner,  28,  29. 

Duncan's  Brigade,  349. 

Duryee,  Col.,  260. 

Early,  Gen.  Jubal  A.,  393. 

Eastern  Shore,  the,  1,  26,  31,  35,  129- 
131. 

"Eastwood,"  the  home  of  Mr.  Wise's 
daughter,  Mrs.  Hobson,  329-335. 

Edge  Hill,  Mr.  Wise's  home  in  Acco- 
mack,  burned,  70. 

Edmunds,  John  R.,  179,  180,  186. 

Ellett,  Charles,  137. 

Ellis,  Vespasian,  31. 

Ellyson,  Henry  K.,  contests  the  may- 
orship  of  Richmond,  Va.,  381,  382. 

Elzey,  Gen.  Arnold,  322. 

Emerson,  Ralph  Waldo,  229;  extract 
from  the  lecture  on  "  Courage  "  about 
Gov.  Wise  and  John  Brown,  246  note; 
Salem  speech  on  John  Brown,  259. 

Emigrant  Aid  Society,  the,  210,  241, 
242,264. 

English,  Thomas  Dunn,  170. 

Ewell,  Gen.,  323,  362. 

Ewing,  Thomas,  speech  of,  at  the  "  ex 
punging"  scene,  69. 

Faulkner,  Charles  J.,  22,  133,  147. 
Feary,  Lieut.,  his  meeting  with  Wise 

at  Appomattox,  370. 
Ferguson,  James  H.,  of  Logan,  147. 
Field,  Capt.  E.,  410  note,  412. 
Fillmore,  Millard,  42,  48,  205,  208. 
Finnegan,  Gen.,  326,  328. 
Finney,  Louis  C.  H.,  146. 
Fisher,  M.  W.,  31. 
Fitzhugh,  Judge  E.  H.,  380. 
Fitz  Lee,  320,  360. 
Fletcher,  Thomas,  29. 
Flournoy,  Thomas  F.,  candidate  for 

governor,  179-183, 186,  202,  203. 


428 


INDEX 


Floyd,  Benjamin  R.,  of  Wythe,  147; 

—  Gen.  John  B.,  204, 225,  290-304. 
Fogg,  Francis  B.,  29. 

Folly  Creek,  6,  10, 11. 

Fontaine,  Col.  Edmund,  277. 

Foster,  Ephraim  H.,  29;  — Gen.,  310, 

311. 

Franklin,  Beujamin,  44. 
Frazier's  Farm,  318. 
Fredericksburg,  215. 
Freedman's  Bureau,  in  possession  of 

Mr.  Wise's  home,  371,  373,  374. 
Fre'mont,  John,  93,  208,  210. 
French,  Capt.,  318. 
Fullerton,  Alexander,  of  Philadelphia, 

9;  — Mrs.  Valeria,  8. 
Funsten,  Oliver,  276. 

Gardner,  Mr.,  99. 

Garnett,  Dr.,  117,  372, 378 ;  —  Mrs.,  372, 

378,  389,  421;  — M.  R.  H.,  of  Essex, 

147 ;  —  Gen.  Robert  S.,  284,  289. 
Garrison,  William  Lloyd,  373;  founds 

the  Liberator,  45. 
Gauley  Bridge,  284,  286,  288,  290,  292, 

294,  296,  298-300;  — Mountain,  293; 

—  River,  290-300. 

George,  Henry,  on  landholding,  409. 

Gettysburg,  368. 

Gholson,  Mr.,  77. 

Gibbons,  Gen.  John,  371. 

Giles,  William  B.,  131. 

Gilbert,  T.,  228. 

Gillett,  Tabitha,  17. 

Gilmer,  Thomas  W.,  55,  93,  95. 

Gillmore,  Maj.-Gen.,  326,  342,  343, 
346. 

Goode,  Col.  J.  Thomas,  318;  in  com 
mand  Wise's  Brigade  in  the  retreat 
on  Appomattox,  353,  357,  361,  363. 

Gordon,  Mr.,  131. 

Gracie's  Alabama  Brigade,  354. 

Graham's  Battery,  344,  347. 

Grant,  Gen.  U.  S.,  337,  339,  341,  345, 
391,  392,  403. 

Graves,  William  J.,  80-85. 

Graves-Cilley  duel,  the,  58,  80-86. 

Great  Bridge,  the,  314,  317. 

Greeley,  Horace,  205,  229,  391. 

Green,  a  follower  of  John  Brown,  248, 
255;  Duff,  90;— William,  one  of 
John  Brown's  counsel,  248. 


Griffin,  John  Q.  A.,  259. 
Grundy,  Felix,  29. 

Hagood,  Gen.,  351. 

Hagood's  Brigade,  351. 

Hale,  Hon.  John  P.,  229;  — Mrs.  Sara 
J.,  214. 

Halleck,  Lieut.,  visits  Rio  with  Gen. 
Sherman,  117. 

Hambleton,  quotations  from  his  his 
tory  of  the  Campaign  of  1855,  42, 
171,  179,  199. 

Hamilton,  Hon.  Hamilton,  British 
minister  to  the  Court  of  Brazil,  115. 

Hammond,  Mr.,  of  South  Carolina,  411. 

Hancock,  Gen.,  352. 

Hancock's  Corps,  353. 

Harman,  John  A.,  276,  277 ;  —William 
H.,  204. 

Harper,  Kenton,  279. 

Harper's  Ferry,  John  Brown's  raid  on, 
240-245 ;  seizure  of  arms  at,  275. 

Harris,  Col.,  328. 

Harrison,  Lieut.-Col.,  360,  361;  — Rev. 
Peyton,  418,  419;  — Col.  Randolph, 
351;  —William  Henry,  66;  nomi 
nated  and  elected  President,  90,  91 ; 
death  of,  a  month  after  inaugura 
tion,  92. 

Harvie,  Lewis  E.,  269,  271,  272. 

Hatcher's  Run,  357-360. 

Haverhill  petition,  the,  57,  59,  86. 

Hawkins,  Col.  Rush  C.,  311. 

Hawk's  Nest,  292,  294-296. 

Hawley,  Col.  Joseph  R.,  344. 

Hays,  Andrew,  29 ;  —  O.  B.,  29. 

Hays,  Gen.  Wm.,  374. 

Hazlett,  Lieut.,  311. 

Henningsen,  Col.  Charles  F.,  286,  301, 
313. 

Henry,  James,  59 ;  —  Mary  (Polly),  5. 

"  Hermitage,"  the,  home  of  Gen.  Jack 
son,  27,  28. 

Higginson,  Thomas  Wentworth,  259. 

Hill,  Maj.  J.  C.,  354. 

Billiard,  Henry,  92. 

Hinks,  Gen.  Edward  W.,  343,  347-350. 

Hoar,  Mr.,  on  Webster's  style,  414. 

Hobson,  Mrs.,  Mr.  Wise's  daughter, 
329;— Plumer,  330,  333,  336. 

Hoke,  Gen.,  352. 

Hoke's  Division,  342,  352. 


INDEX 


429 


Holcombe,  of  Albemarle,  272,  277,  278 ; 
Legion,  the,  320. 

Hollywood  Cemetery,  interment  of 
James  Monroe  in,  260. 

Holmes,  Gen.  Theophilus,  318. 

Holten,  3. 

Hope,  James  B.,  415. 

Hopkins,  Henry  L.,  204 ;  —  George  W., 
of  Washington,  147. 

Hopper,  B.,  73. 

Houston, 'Hon.  Sam.,  of  Texas,  229. 

Howard,  Gen.,  373. 

Howe,  S.  G.,  228. 

Huger,  Maj.  Benjamin,  305-308,  313, 
314. 

Hughes,  Robert  W.,  editor  of  the  Rich 
mond  Examiner,  175,  204. 

Humphreys,  Gen.,  327,  370. 

Hunter,  Andrew,  243,  245, 246,  249,  255 ; 

—  A.  M.  T. ,  22, 163, 263 ;  —  Moses,  22. 
Hunton,  Gen.  Eppa,  359,  360,  365. 
Hunton's  Brigade,  359. 

Imboden,  John  D.,  177,  275-277. 
Intelligencer,  the,  86. 

Jackson,  Gen.  Andrew,  20,  21,  26,  34, 
39 ;  administration  of,  65-67,  87 ; 
Wise's  visit  to,  on  his  wedding  jour 
ney,  27,  28;  his  Proclamation,  35; 
removal  of  deposits  from  the  Bank 
of  the  United  States,  43,  66. 

Jackson  Corresponding  Committee,  35. 

Janney,  John,  of  Loudoun,  147,  281. 

Jefferson,  Maria,  8;— Thomas,  6,  118, 
129, 130, 176,  182. 

Jenkins,  Capt.,  289;  — Maj.,  325-327; 

—  Albert   Gallatin,  211;  — Gen.  M. 
326. 

Jennings,  Obadiah,  20,  25,  27,  28;  — 
Ann,  20,  25. 

Johnson,  Andrew,  nominated  as  Vice- 
President,  66;  — Gen.  Bushrod,  352, 
353,  357,  363,  364;  — Chapman,  131; 

—  Joseph,  of  Harrison,  147,  171,  220; 

—  William  R.,  21. 

Johnson's  (Bushrod)  Division,  5,  352; 

Brigade,  353. 
Johnston,  Gen.  Albert  Sydney,  328 ;  — 

Alexander,  205;— Gen.  Joseph  E., 

313. 
Jones,  George  W.,  204,  207  ;  second  to 


Cilley  in  the  Graves-Cilley  duel,  82- 

85. 
Jordan,  Col.  J.  V.,  310,  311;— Capt. 

Win.,  362. 
Joynes,  John  C.,  11,  14;  —  Thomas  R., 

of  Accomack,  60. 

Kanawha  Valley,  284-304. 

Kansas,  letters  by  Mr.   Wise  on  the 

admission   of,    232-239 ;    career   of 

John  Brown  in,  240,  242. 
Kansas-Nebraska  Bill,  the,  232-239. 
Kautz,  Gen.  August  V.,  342-349. 
Kennon,  Mr.,  99. 
Know-nothing  Order,  the,  166, 167, 174, 

178,  192,  196,  202,  203,  204,  370. 
Knox,  Gen.,  11. 

Lacouture,  E.,  letter  of  Mr.  Wise  to, 
217-220. 

Lafayette,  19, 165,  192,  193. 

Lamar,  Senator  L.  Q.  C.,  396,  397,  411. 

Lawrence,  Hon.  Amos  A.,  241. 

Leake,  Shelton  F.,  168,  170,  204;  — 
Walter  D.,  of  Goochland,  147. 

Ledlie's  Division,  353. 

Lee,  George  Hay,  22,  248;— Henry, 
half-brother  of  Gen.  Robert  E.,  28 ; 
— Fitzhugh,  Maj  .-Gen.,  360,  365;  — 
Robert  E.,  28,  65,  244,  292,  302-304, 
316,  317,  319,  358,  364,  369,  372-376. 

Legare,  Mr.,  96. 

Leigh,  Benjamin  W.,  131, 141 ;  —Judge 
William,  179. 

Letcher,  John,  of  Rockbridge,  142, 147, 
168, 278. 

Letters  of  Henry  A.  Wise,  quoted,  on : 
declining  to  address  a  meeting  of 
Anti-Lecompton  Democrats,  236-239  ; 
declining  to  address  the  Mercantile 
Library  Association,  Boston,  230- 
232 ;  declining  to  lecture  on  slavery, 
at  Tremont  Temple,  Boston,  227-230 ; 
the  American  party,  to  a  committee 
of  citizens,  168,  169;  the  approach 
of  death,  to  his  daughter,  422;  the 
battle  of  Roanoke  Island,  to  Gen. 
Huger,  313;  the  campaign  of  1855, 
204,  do.  to  Geo.  W.  Jones,  204 ;  the 
Ceredo  colony,  to  A.  G.  Jenkins, 
211-213;  the  Christmas  season,  to 
his  daughter,  379,  389;  closing  his 


430 


INDEX 


campaign  in  1855,  204 ;  the  defences 
of  Roanoke  Island,  to  Mr.  Benjamin, 
306, 307 ;  the  "  expunging  "  scene,  to 
his  wife,  69,  70;  on  the  Graves- 
Cilley  duel,  86,  do.  to  Geo.  W.  Jones, 
82-84;  John  Brown,  to  the  Hon. 
Henry  Wilson,  249-251 ;  the  Kansas- 
Nebraska  Bill,  to  a  Democratic 
meeting  in  New  York,  233-236 ;  the 
loss  of  his  wife,  to  Dr.  Robert  Reed, 
71-73 ;  the  material  condition  of  Va. 
in  1857,  to  E.  Lacouture,  217-220 ;  his 
parole,  to  Dr.  Garnett,  372 ;  his  per 
sonal  relations  with  Clay,  88;  the 
petitions  for  abolition,  to  Gov.  Taze- 
well,  52-54,  do.  to  Mrs.  Wise,  55; 
the  policy  of  Grant  in  the  Louisiana 
troubles  of  1875,  392;  refusing  to 
proclaim  a  Thanksgiving,  to  Mrs. 
S.  J.  Hale,  214,  215 ;  remaining  at 
Hawk's  Nest,  to  Gen.  Floyd,  296; 
resigning  from  Congress,  to  the 
people  of  his  district,  105,  106;  his 
return  to  Accomack  from  Nashville, 
31;  running  for  President,  to  Geo. 
W.  Jones,  207,  do.  to  Robert  Tyler, 
204;  the  sale  of  "Only,"  to  Geo. 
Booker,  262,  263;  secession,  Dec.  1, 
1860,  267,  268,  do.  to  the  Hon.  Fer 
nando  Wood,  382,  383;  slavery,  to 
the  Rev.  Mr.  Adams,  160-162,  to 
Richard  A.  Wise,  from  the  Conven 
tion  of  1861,  270 ;  the  slave-trade  in 
Brazil,  to  Maxwell,  Wright,  &  Co., 
110-115 ;  the  status  of  the  slave  after 
the  war,  396;  temperance,  to  B. 
Hopper,  73-75;  the  test-oath,  to 
Gen.  Lee,  376;  Tyler's  administra 
tion,  to  Caleb  Gushing,  101,  102; 
the  Union,  to  Wm.  H.  Roy,  162, 163; 
the  vegetation  of  Brazil,  116,  117; 
his  wish  for  a  conference  of  gov 
ernors,  to  Gov.  Ligon,  209 ;  for  a  con 
vention  of  States,  to  the  Hon.  Henry 
Wilson,  210. 

Ligon,  Gov.  Thomas  W.,  209. 

Lincoln,  Abraham,  181,265-269;  elec 
tion,  266;  call  for  troops,  267. 

Livemore,  Col.  T.  L.,  348  note,  350. 

Longstreet,  Gen.,  319. 

Lynch,  Capt.,  306,  310,  315. 

Lyons,  James,  of  Richmond,  147,  155, 


185,    204;  — Mary    Elizabeth,    Mr. 
Wise's  third  wife,  155. 
Lytle,  Col.  Wm.  H.,  297. 

McCarthy,  Col.  John,  76. 

McCausland,  294. 

McClellan,  Gen.,  288-289,  304,  322. 

McComas,  Elisha  W.,  171,  204. 

McDuffie,  George,  42,  66;  his  part  in 
the  nomination  of  Calhoun  as  Secre 
tary  of  State,  96-101. 

McFarland,  William  H.,  269. 

McGill,  Bishop,  185. 

McGowan's  Brigade,  359. 

McLean,  90. 

Madison,  James,  37,  130,  131,  182,  265, 
380. 

Madisonian,  the,  86. 

Mahone,  Gen.  Wm.,  313,  358. 

Mallory,  the  Hon.  Stephen  R.,  317. 

Malvern  Hill,  318. 

Mangum,  W.  P.,  69. 

Mann,  Gen.,  373. 

Marcy,  99. 

Margaret  Academy,  16,  17. 

Marshal],  Col.  Charles,  314;  — John, 
131:  — Thomas  F.,  55. 

Martindale,  in  the  attack  on  Peters 
burg,  348-350. 

Maryland  State  Temperance  Society, 
73. 

Mason,  James  M.,  22;  — John  Y.,  35, 
42,  147. 

Mayo,  P.  P.,  31. 

Meade,  Col.  George,  son  of  the  follow 
ing,  368;  — Gen.  Geo.  G.,  358,  360, 
367-369 ;  —  Richard  K.,  204. 

Meadow  Bluff,  292,  300-303 ;— River, 
298. 

Menefee,  Richard  H.,  associated  with 
Wise  as  second  in  the  Graves-Cilley 
duel,  82-85. 

Mercantile  Library  Association,  Bos 
ton,  230. 

Mercer,  Mr.,  131. 

Meredith,  John  A.,  of  Richmond,  147. 

Merrimac-Monitor  battle,  the,  316. 

Miles,  Gen.,  374. 

Miller,  Dr.,  brother-in-law  of  John 
Tyler,  98,  99. 

Millson,  Hon.  John  S.,  371,  372. 

Moncure,  Judge  R.  C.  L.,  248. 


INDEX 


431 


Monroe,  James,  118, 131,  132,  260. 
Moore,  Samuel  McD.,  269. 
Morson,  James  M.,  332. 
Moseley,  William,  262. 
Mussey,  B.  B.,  228. 

Nag's  Head,  308-312. 

Nashville,  Wise's  life  and  friends  in, 

26,  28-30. 

Neff,  Lieut.-Col.,  289. 
Newton,  A.  G.,  373 ;  —  Gen.  John,  341. 
New  York  Courier  and  Enquirer,  80, 85. 
Nicholas,  Wilson  Gary,  6,  140. 
Norfolk,  135,  140,  141,  176,  305,  308, 

314,  372-374,  377,  378. 
Norton,  Col.,  289. 
Nullification,  35,  37,  39. 

"Old  Hickory,"  34;  Mr.  Wise's  im 
pressions  of,  21,  28. 

Onancock,  31,  168,  227. 

Onancock  Creek,  18,  120. 

"  Only,"  120,  168,  227. 

Oratory  of  Henry  A.  Wise,  the,  414 ;  de 
scribed  by  James  Barren  Hope,  415, 
416 ;  quotations  from,  see  Speeches. 

Overby,  Capt.  Robert  Y.,  371. 

Overton,  Judge,  28. 

Page,  Col.  Powhatan  K.,  318,  321,  325, 

353. 

Parke,  Gen.,  310,  311. 
Parker,  Henry  T.,  228;— Severn  E., 

39;  — Theodore,  259;  — William  H., 

277,  367. 

Par  ton,  James,  42. 
Patton,  Major  George  8.,  288,  289;  — 

John  M.,  179, 182 ;  resolutions,  1837, 57. 
Peace  Conference,  the,  269,  272. 
Perrin,  Abner,  361,  362. 
Peterkin,  Rev.  Joshua,  421. 
Petersburg,  6, 140, 215, 338, 356, 357, 368. 
Peyton,  Hon.  Baillie,  29,  76,  97. 
Phillips,  Wendell,  229,  259,  280. 
Pickett,  Gen.  G.  E.,  358,  361-363. 
Pierpont,  Rev.  John,  229. 
Pierce,  Franklin,  42,  164,  242. 
Piggott's  Mill,  292-294. 
Pinckney,  Henry  L.,  51;  resolutions, 

the,  51,  57. 

Poindexter,  George,  66. 
Polk,  James  Knox,  42,  101,  119. 


Pollard,  E.  A.,  a  criticism  of  Mr.  Wise's 
style  by,  403,  404. 

Porter,  of  Pennsylvania,  97. 

Portsmouth,  141. 

Potter's  Division,  353. 

Powell,  Alfred  H.,  22,  131. 

Prentiss,  Sargent  S.,  41,  75,  414;  a 
reminiscence  of,  by  Wise,  76,  78. 

Preston,  William  Ballard,  90,  91,  269, 
274. 

Princeton,  the,  96, 97. 

Pryor,  Roger  A.,  editor  of  the  Rich 
mond  Enquirer,  204. 

Raleigh,  210. 

Randolph,  Thomas  J.,  of  Albemarle, 
147 ;  John,  of  Roanoke,  44,  131,  179. 

Ransom's  Brigade,  358. 

Reed,  Dr.  Robert  R.,  71. 

Reno,  Gen.,  310,  311. 

Rhett,  Robert  B.,  57. 

Richardson,  Col.,  312. 

Richmond,  135,  138,  140,  155,  156,  163, 
176,  215,  416. 

Richmond  Blues,  the,  285,  287. 

Richmond  Examiner,  the,  204 ;  on  the 
nomination  of  Mr.  Wise,  for  gov 
ernor,  171;  on  Know-nothingism, 
175,  176;  Satire  by  Lorraine  on  the 
Convention  of  1860,  in  the,  272;  — 
Enquirer,  the,  35,  37,  204,  211 ;  Jef 
ferson's  letter  in,  131;  Eastern  Va., 
described  in,  135, 136 ;  Championship 
of  Gov.  Wise  as  a  presidential  can 
didate,  263 ;  —  Times,  the,  anecdote 
of  Mr.  Wise  in,  123,  128;—  Whig, 
103, 186,  266,  268. 

Rio,  Mr.  Wise's  residence  in,  as 
American  minister  to  Brazil,  108- 
119. 

Rives,  William  C.,  69,  269,  320,  321. 

Rives's  Battery,  320,  321. 

Roanoke  College,  speech  by  Mr.  Wise 
at,  412-414. 

Roanoke  Island,  305-315,  317,  371. 

Robertson,  Judge  William  J.,  248;  — 
Wyndham,  137. 

Robinson,  Gov.  Charles,  241,  242;  — 
Moncure,  137,  221. 

Rolleston,  262,  282,  304,  316,  329,  371. 

Ropes,  John  C.,  343,  355,  368. 

Rosecrans,  Gen.,  288,  293-296,  298,  302. 


432 


INDEX 


Roy,  William  H.,  162. 
Royall,  Mr.,  397. 

Sailor's  Creek,  361-366. 

Samford,  William  F.,  227. 

Samuels,  Green  B.,  of  Shenandoah, 
22,  147. 

Scarburgh,  Capt.  Edmund,  3;  —  Col. 
Edmund,  3;  — George  P.,  31;— Han 
nah,  3. 

Scary  Creek,  the  encounter  at,  288, 289. 

Schimmelfinnig,  Gen.  Alex.,  326. 

Schofield,  Gen.,  374,  375. 

Scott,  John  W.,  19;— Robert  E.,  of 
Fauquier,  147,  148,  151,  269,  274;  — 
Winfield,  90. 

Secession,  passage  of  the  ordinance  of, 
280,  281 ;  letters  from  Mr.  Wise  on, 
380-387. 

Seddon,  Hon.  James  A..,  168, 332-334, 337. 

Segar,  Joseph,  139. 

Selden,  Lieut.,  312. 

Seward,  Secretary,  266,  391,  411. 

Sewell  Mountain,  292,  300;  Big,  300, 
302 ;  Little,  300-302. 

Shaw,  Col.  H.  M.,  30G,  309,  311. 

Sheffey,  Hugh  W.,  of  Augusta,  147. 

Sherman,  Gen.,  117. 

Shields,  a  follower  of  John  Brown, 
248,  255;  — Joseph  D.,  76. 

Shipman,  Judge  William  D.,  380. 

Slade,  Win.,  57. 

Slavery,  130,  215,  405-410;  the  Tre- 
mont  Temple  Lectures  on,  227-230; 
in  the  District  of  Columbia,  44,  47, 
62,  89 ;  petitions  for  the  abolition  of, 
47,  51-54. 

Slave-trade,  the,  in  Brazil,  109-116  ; 
discontinued,  116. 

Smith,  Gerrit,  259 ;  —  Capt.  John,  1, 26 ; 
—  Gen.  W.  F.  (Baldy),  345,  352;  — 
Larkin,  6;— Col.  Wm.  S.,  297. 

Southard,  Mr.,  91. 

Speeches  of  Henry  A.  Wise,  quoted : 
at  Alexandria,  in  1855,  187-196;  at 
the  Constitutional  Convention,  1861, 
148-150,  273,  279 ;  at  the  dedication 
of  Stonewall  Cemetery,  Winchester, 
398-401 ;  at  a  dinner  given  him  in 
Norfolk,  140,  141;  at  a  ratification 
meeting  in  1856,  208;  at  Roanoke 
College,  412-414 ;  at  the  serenade  to 


Pres.  Davis,  Richmond,  282,  283  ;  at 
the  unveiling  of  Crawford's  statue 
of  Washington,  Richmond,  260,  261 ; 
at  Washington  on  his  election  as 
Gov.  of  Va.  203 ;  in  Congress,  1837, 
on  the  condition  of  the  south,  142, 
143  ;  in  1841,  on  nullification,  39, 40 ; 
on  petitions  for  abolition,  48,  51; 
testifying  in  the  boundary  line  dis 
pute,  103, 104;  in  his  first  campaign, 
39;  in  the  campaign  of  1855,  61,  62, 
187-196;  of  1860,  264-266;  in  the 
House  of  Representatives,  on  the 
question  of  appointing  a  chaplain, 
78,  79 ;  on  a  bill  for  building  an  iron 
clad,  63,  64;  on  appointments  to 
office,  94, 95 ;  on  the  career  of  Wise's 
Brigade,  358-366;  on  "old  bache 
lors,"  155;  on  the  abolition  of  slav 
ery  to  the  members  of  legislature, 
Richmond,  1850,  156-160;  to  people 
of  the  "  York  "  district,  144,  145 ;  to 
the  Virginia  militia,  246,  247. 

Spooner,  W.  B.,  228. 

Stanard,  Robert  C.,  of  Richmond,  147, 
148. 

Starke,  Maj.  A.  W.,  318. 

Staunton,  169. 

Steele,  Capt.,  357. 

Stevens,  a  follower  of  John  Brown, 
244,  248,  254,  255;  — Edward  A.,  in 
ventor  of  an  ironclad,  63,  64;  — 
Robert  L.,  brother  of  Edward,  64. 

Stevenson,  Andrew,  35,  Speaker  of  the 
House,  1833,  42. 

Stewart,  John,  6. 

Stickney,  Lieut.,  his  meeting  with 
Wise  after  Appomattox,  370. 

Stockton,  Mr.,  99. 

Stone,  James  W.,  228. 

Stoneman,  Gen.,  in  command  at  Rich 
mond  after  the  war,  381. 

Stuart,  Alexander  H.  H.,  183,  256. 

Sturdivant,  Nat,  349. 

Sturdivant's  Battery,  342. 

Sturgis,  Rev.  J.  R.,  123. 

Summers,  Geo.  W.,  of  Kanawha,  147, 
151,  171,  178 ;  —  Lewis,  131,  147. 

Sumner,  the  Hon.  Charles,  229,  259. 

Sumter,  the  fall  of,  267,  274. 

Syme,  John,  editor  of  the  Petersburg 
Intelligencer,  178. 


INDEX 


433 


Tabb,  Col.  Wra.  B.,  318-322,  336,  362. 

Taliaferro,  Gen.  William  B.  KM,  249; 
—  Col.,  342,  343. 

Taylor,  Farmer,  318,  319 ;  —  Robert  B., 
131,  140. 

Tazewell,  Littleton  W.,  131,  141,  151. 

Terry,  Gen.  Alfred  H.,  247  note,  339, 
373,  381. 

"Test  Oaths,"  Mr.  Wise's  views  on, 
376;  correspondence  between  Wise 
and  R.  E.  Lee  on,  376,  377. 

Texas,  annexation  of,  95,  96,  101. 

Thayer,  Eli,  210,  211,  241,  242. 

Thoreau,  Henry,  259. 

Tod,  David,  119. 

Tompkins,  Col.  Christopher  Q.,  286, 
291,  294,  296. 

Tremont  Temple,  Lectures  on  Slavery, 
227-230:  meeting  in,  on  the  day  of 
John  Brown's  execution,  259. 

Tucker,  Henry  St.  George,  22,  23,  25, 
34,  407;  — Mrs.,  23,  24. 

Turner,  Nat.,  the  insurrection  of,  45. 

Tyler,  Col.  E.  B.,  293, 294 ;  —John,  nom 
inated  for  vice-president,  90 ;  at  the 
Whig  convention,  1840,  91 ;  becomes 
president  on  the  death  of  Harrison, 
92;  his  administration,  93-104,  414; 
the  nomination  of  Calhoun  as  sec 
retary  of  war,  96-101 ;  sends  to  Con 
gress  the  name  of  Wise  as  minister 
to  Brazil,  104 ;  in  the  Convention  of, 
61,  272,  280;  his  memoir  in  "Seven 
Decades  of  the  Union,"  418;  — 
Robert,  letter  from  Mr.  Wise  to,  on 
nomination  to  the  presidency,  207. 

United  States  Bank,  43;  Jackson's 
hostility  to,  43, 88 ;  charter  of,  vetoed 
by  Tyler,  92,  94. 

Upham,  Charles  W.,  229. 

Upshur,  Abel  P.,  39,  102,  131,  141,  148, 
149;  the  death  of,  95,  96,  99. 

Van  Buren,  Martin,  35,  66,  87,  90,  101; 
Administration,  the,  87,  91,  94. 

Virginia,  breach  between  the  western 
and  the  tidewater  districts,  130-137 ; 
—in  1850,  political  conditions  of,  129 ; 
absence  of  cities,  134,  135,  140,  215 ; 
tidewater,  26, 129, 131, 136, 138 ;  west 
ern,  129,  132 ;  railroads  of,  137,  220, 
2r 


283,  341 ;  travel  in,  138 ;  the  struggle 
for  equality  of  representation  in, 
143-151;  — in  1855,  economic  condi 
tion,  215-220;  financial  condition, 
220-226;  difficulties  of  canvassing 
in,  187;  the  campaign  of  1855  in, 
165-204 ;  in  1857,  material  condition 
of,  217-220;  revenues  of,  Mr.  Wise's 
message  to  legislature,  221 ;  after  the 
war,  382-389. 

Virginia-Maryland  Boundary  Line 
Commission,  418. 

Von  Hoist,  on  the  attitude  of  the 
South  to  the  Anti-Romanist  feeling 
in  the  American  party,  176 ;  on  the 
nomination  of  Buchanan,  208;  on 
Mr.  Wise's  treatment  of  John  Brown, 
246. 

Wallace,  Gen.  W.  H.,  358,  361,  362. 
Wallace's  Brigade,  359-363. 
Warwick,  Lieut.  Barksdale,  360. 
Washburn,  W.,  228. 
Washington,  George,  10,  12,  232,  260; 

—  Col.  Lewis,  244,  247. 
Washington  College,  17,  18,  20, 21. 
Ward,  Capt.,  289. 
War  Department,  of  the  Confederate 

States,  298,  303,  305,  307,  308,  313- 

317,  322,  334,  337. 
Warrington,  Commodore,  102. 
Webb,  James  Watson,  80,  81,  85. 
i  Webster,    42,    75,    91,    96 ;    protests 

against  the  "  expunging,"  69. 
West  Virginia,  formation  of,  397. 
White,  Hugh  Lawson,  66,  76,  87,  88; 

Capt.  John  H.,  354. 
White  Sulphur  Springs,  284,  290,  291. 
Whiting,  Gen.  W.  H.  C.,  336-339. 
Whitman,  93. 
Whitney,  Reuben  M.,  66. 
Wiatt,  Chaplain  W.  E,,  360. 
Willey,  Waitman  T.,  of  Monongalia, 

147,  269. 

Williams,  George  F.,  228. 
Williamsburg,  320,  322. 
Wilmot,  Hon.  David,  229. 
Wilson,  Henry,  210, 249 ;  —  Prof.  Wood- 
row,  on  the  "  new  generation  "  led 

by  Jackson,  43. 

Winchester,  22,  25 ;  the  battle  of,  289. 
Wirt,  William,  6, 12. 


434 


INDEX 


Wise,  Ann  Jennings,  20 ;  marriage  to 
Mr.  Wise,  27;  death,  70;  Mr.  Wise's 
letter  on  the  death  of,  71-73;  —  Eliza 
beth,  14;  — George  Douglas,  5,  354, 
378;  — Henry  A.,  the  Rev.,  368;  — 
John,  3,  4;  — John  C.,  262;  — John 
James  Henry,  5; — John  Sergeant, 
117, 118,  372,  375,  380;  —  Lewis  War- 
rington,  374 ;  —  O.  Jennings,  285,  311, 
312;  — Sarah  Sergeant,  106,  367;  — 
Sir  William,  3;  — Tully  R.,  30;  — 
Legion,  the,  286,  302,  308. 

Wise,  Henry  A.,  family  of,  3;  parents 
of,  5-8 ;  birth  of,  9 ;  as  a  boy,  a  de 
scription  by  himself,  13;  education  of, 
16-22 ;  law  practice  of,  in  Nashville, 
26,  28-30 ;  marriage  of,  27 ;  return  to 
Accomack,  31 ;  political  views  of, 
34,  39;  entry  into  politics  of,  35-38; 
election  of  to  Congress,  39;  duel 
with  Coke,  40,  41;  career  of,  in 
Congress,  42-107;  in  debates  on 
abolition  petitions,  47-50,  57-61; 
compared  to  Adams,  56;  interest 
in  naval  affairs  of,  63-65;  appear 
ance  of  in  1837,  67 ;  loss  of  his  wife, 
70,  71 ;  temperance  principles  of,  73- 
75;  reminiscences  of  Prentiss  by, 
75-78;  religious  principles,  78;  in 
the  Graves-Cilley  duel,  80-86 ;  attack 
on  by  Adams,  58,  86;  in  the  cam 
paign  of  1840,  87-91 ;  in  the  Tyler  ad 
ministration,  91-101,  106 ;  appointed 
minister  to  Brazil,  106 ;  resignation 
from  Congress,  107 ;  life  in  Rio, 
109-118 ;  views  on  the  slave-trade  in 
Brazil,  110-116;  events  leading  to 
his  return,  119 ;  law  practice  of  in 
Accomack,  120,  121 ;  anecdotes  of, 
122-128 ;  political  opinions,  139-143 ; 
addresses  of  in  1850,  144,  148;  de 
scription  of,  as  seen  in  the  Conven 
tion  of  1850,  152,  153 ;  death  of  the 
wife  of,  155 ;  third  marriage  of,  155 ; 
views  on  slavery,  156;  address  to 
the  Colonization  Society,  156-162; 
on  the  Know-nothing  Order,  168; 
nominated  for  Governor,  170 ;  a  de 
scription  of,  by  Gov.  Cameron,  173 ; 
canvassing  the  State,  187-199 ;  elec 
tion,  202;  on  emigration,  211-213; 
on  interference  between  Church  and 


State,  214,  215 ;  on  economic  con 
ditions  in  Va.,  216-220;  messages  to 
legislature,  220-224 ;  "  Territorial 
Government  "  by,  227;  at  Harper's 
Ferry,  245 ;  impressions  of  John 
Brown,  246 ;  message  concerning 
John  Brown,  251;  unveiling  the 
statue  of  Washington,  260;  views 
on  secession,  267-268;  in  the  Con 
vention  of  1861,  270-281;  in  the 
Confederate  Army,  282-371  ;  the 
campaign  in  western  Va.,  282-304; 
on  Roanoke  Island,  305-315;  in 
South  Carolina,  323-328;  return  to 
Va.,  336;  in  the  defence  of  Peters 
burg,  337-356 ;  the  retreat  to  Appo- 
mattox,  357-3(36  ;  meeting  with  Gen. 
Meade,  367-369 ;  surrender,  366-371 ; 
parole,  371 ;  seizure  of  "Rolleston," 
the  home  of,  373 ;  efforts  to  regain 
his  property  by,  372-375 ;  indictment 
of,  for  treason,  never  pressed,  375, 
376;  views  on  "test  oaths,"  etc., 
376-378;  return  of  to  law  practice, 
379-381;  correspondence  with  Fer 
nando  Wood,  382-391;  views  of,  on 
the  situation  after  the  war,  391-397 ; 
personal  characteristics  and  habits 
of,  402-405 ;  position  of,  in  regard  to 
slavery,  406-410 ;  to  the  war,  412 ;  the 
oratory  of  ,414-416;  religious  views  of, 
419-420 ;  love  of  the  country,  420, 421 ; 
last  illness  and  death  of,  422 ;  tributes 
to,  by  Judge  Crump  and  others,  423. 

Wise's  Brigade,  3,  338-341,  349,  351, 
354,  357-366. 

Writings  of  Henry  A.  Wise,  quoted: 
76,  321,  323,  325-329,  338-342,  345, 
350,  391-393,  412;  his  first  message 
to  legislature,  220 ;  message  on  John 
Brown,  251-254;  on  the  revenues, 
221-224 ;  reports  to  the  War  Depart 
ment,  299,  308, 309 ;  "  Seven  Decades 
of  the  Union,"  20,  21,  26-28,  96-101, 
225,  416 ;  "  Territorial  Government," 
227 ;  see  also  Letters. 

Wylie,  Andrew,  18,  19,  20,  21. 

Wood,  Capt.,  358;— Hon.  Fernando, 
380-387. 

Woodruff,  Col.,  289. 

York  district,  the,  35,  38. 


THE  HISTORY  OF  SOUTH  CAROLINA. 

UNDER   THE  PROPRIETARY  GOVERNMENT, 
7670-77/9. 


BY 


EDWARD   MCCRADY, 

Vicc-Presidcnt  of  the  Historical  Society  of  South  Carolina, 
Member  of  the  Bar  of  Charleston,  S.C. 


Crown  8vo.    Cloth.    Price,  $3.50,  net. 


The  Introductory  Chapter  contains  a  valuable  commentary  on  the  different 
books,  most  of  them  out  of  print,  which  have  been  written  on  South  Carolina; 
then  follow  chapters  on  the  early  attempts  at  colonization,  notably  the  disas 
trous  failure  at  Cape  Fear  and  the  more  successful  effort  at  Port  Royal;  on 
the  administrations  of  one  Governor  after  another,  Sir  John  Yeamans,  William 
Sayles,  Joseph  West,  Sir  John  again,  Joseph  West  again  (and  by  the  way, 
still  again  some  years  later),  and  so  on;  on  the  war  with  Spain,  involving  an 
expedition  into  Florida  and  a  counter  attempt  to  take  Charleston  by  a  naval 
attack  from  Havana;  on  the  steadily  increasing  political  troubles  and  dis 
satisfaction  with  the  Lords  Proprietors;  on  the  Indian  wars,  and  the  depre 
dations  of  pirates;  on  the  systematic  and  successful  attempt  to  clear  their 
coasts  of  the  pirates,  with  a  vivid  account  of  the  naval  battle  in  which  Col. 
Rhett  in  the  Henry  captured  the  notorious  Stede  Bonnet  of  the  Royal  James, 
known  along  the  coast  of  every  colony  from  Jamaica  to  Newfoundland; 
Bonnet's  trial  before  a  Judge  almost  as  notorious  as  himself  forms  the  topic 
of  another  noteworthy  chapter;  an  account  of  the  Colony's  efforts  to  get 
rid  of  Judge  Trott,  after  the  pirate  was  disposed  of,  follows,  and  the  volume 
closes  with  the  political  struggles  which  ended  in  turning  over  the  Colony  to 
the  Crown,  thus  ending  the  Proprietary  Government  which  had  proved  so 
capricious  and  inefficient. 


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THE 

ECONOMIC  HISTORY  OF  VIRGINIA 

IN  THE 

SEVENTEENTH  CENTURY. 

By  PHILIP   ALEXANDER    BRUCE, 

Author  of  "The  Plantation  Negro  as  a  Freeman,"  Corresponding  Secretary 
of  the  Virginia  Historical  Society,  etc. 

Two  Volumes.    8vo.     Cloth.    Price,  $6.00. 


Alice  Morse  Earle. 

"  I  cannot  tell  how  greatly  I  value  the  '  Economic  History  of  Virginia  in  the  Seven 
teenth  Century,'  not  only  for  its  historical  information,  but  that  it  is  given,  in  such  well- 
rounded  valuable  literary  shape.  What  such  a  book  means  and  will  prove  to  future  students 
cannot  now  be  estimated.  I  have  always  felt  baffled  by  my  lack  of  real  knowledge  of  the 
Virginia  Colony.  Now  I  know  it." 

Thomas  Nelson  Page. 

"  A  great  work.  From  beginning  to  end  I  found  it  absorbingly  interesting.  It  is  com 
pletely  satisfactory.  It  leaves  me  with  the  conviction  that  the  subject  has  been  handled  fully 
and  finally.  Others  may  follow  and  do  service.  Mr.  Bruce  has  discovered  and  established 
his  domain,  and  that  is  his  for  all  time.  He  has  made  a  book  which  will  be  always  a  part  of 
the  history  of  Virginia." 

New  Orleans  Picayune. 

"  Mr.  Bruce  has  done  for  his  State  what  has  been  done  for  no  other  State  in  the  Union,  if 
for  any  other  country  of  the  world.  The  work  is  thoroughly  and  exhaustively  done,  and  the 
reader  will  find  a  pleasant  style,  coupled  with  vast  erudition.  Despite  the  abstract  nature  of 
the  subject,  the  ordinary  literary  reader  will  find  it  very  interesting,  and  will  come  to 
see  that  there  is  another  and  grander  field  for  the  historian  than  the  relation  of  sieges,  battles, 
and  diplomatic  intrigues.  Mr.  Bruce  has  done  a  good  work  for  Virginia,  of  which  the 
Virginians  may  well  be  proud." 

Philadelphia  Evening  Telegraph. 

"  One  of  the  most  valuable  contributions  to  the  intimate  historical  knowledge  of  America. 
This  work  will  be  useful  for  all  time,  and  not  merely  to  the  lay  reader  who  wishes  to 
know  accurately  concerning  the  early  conditions  of  life  in  Virginia,  but  to  the  political 
economist  and  the  social  scientist  who  is  laboring  to  advance  the  substantial  intellectual 
interests  of  the  world." 

New  York  Evening  Sun. 

"  To  systematic  American  Colonial  history  library  catalogues  contain  no  single  title 
more  valuable  than  the  one  before  us.  The  student  of  American  history  is  here  put  in 
possession  of  an  account  of  the  state  of  the  people  in  one  of  the  principal  and  most  significant 
colonies  that  will  be  accepted  as  final  within  its  adopted  field." 


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